Alpha and Omega: Darkness
by DariaAlpha
Summary: A deadly virus spreading through Jasper kills wolves before they can be cured, then their bodies disappear without a trace. After someone is found dead by Claws, the truth is soon uncovered. And it's much worse than any virus, yet it is the source of the virus. It is a danger that only hunts at night, drinking the blood of the living. In the process, more of their own are created…
1. Prologue: A Time of Peace

**Prologue**

**A Time of Peace**

Jasper National Park in Canada was a nature reserve home to four different wolf packs—the united Eastern and Western Packs, the Northern Pack, and the Southern Pack. While the Northern Wolf Pack was on good terms with the Eastern and Western Packs, the Southern Wolf Pack was not. That was because of what took place between them over a year-and-a-half ago, involving a then adolescent Southern Pack she-wolf called Mica. After having her life saved by him, she'd fallen in love with a male Western Pack wolf called Stinky. But her parents hadn't been supportive of their love because they'd arranged a marriage between their daughter and another Southern Pack Wolf called Clint. So, with the help of her little sister, Airmead, Mica ran away from home and married Stinky. She'd been disowned by her parents and they'd been disowned by her. Mica hadn't seen them since, nor had many of her oldest little brothers and sisters who'd also ran away from home when their parents tried to make them go through arranged marriages. More and more of them were showing up in the Western Wolf Pack's Territory every few weeks to every month. Only three of Mica's siblings, all her little Omega brothers, were the only ones left in the Southern Wolf Pack's Territory.

Because they were all almost adults now, many of them lived by themselves or with one of two of each other. The exception to that was the few, such as Airmead, an Alpha and the second oldest, had found mates, and lived with them instead of with their fellow runaway siblings.

Although the Eastern and Western Pack Wolves thought after Mica ran away from her birth pack, their troubles would be over, a month after Mica and Stinky got married, a former rogue wolf from their rival pack in Banff National Park had arrived in Jasper with a warning. Her warning had been that her father, King, and her mother, Queen, two demented, almost sadistic Alpha wolves, and the leaders of the Banff Wolf Pack, had been planning to overthrow all of Jasper. They'd wanted to unit all four Jasper Wolf Packs with their own and be the Alpha female of all five packs. All of the wolves who didn't become loyal to King and Queen, and all non-Alpha wolves, would've become slaves if they'd succeeded.

It hadn't been easy for the former Alpha females, Kate, and her Omega mate Humphrey, to defeat the rogues. The first of several attacks on Jasper by the rogues had involved two rogues called Melissa and Geoff. They'd attacked a group of younger wolves at a pond near the special mountain known as The Howling Rock, but they'd been stopped by the former rogue known as Princess, the on who'd warned them about her parents' plan, and a former Northern Pack Alpha called Fleet. Fleet's little sister, Magril, an Alpha, and her then newly wedded Alpha mate Liam, would've been killed if it weren't for their actions. Although she'd admitted to Kate that she wasn't loyal to King, and had wanted to find a reason to get away from Banff for years, even telling them all of King's war plans, Geoff hadn't given up his loyal of King. He'd been killed by Kate for that and buried at the side of a hill without any funeral because he was an enemy of their back.

Not long after this, when Princess and Melissa had been sent by Kate to enlist reinforcements from the Northern Wolf Pack, things had gotten worse. Just after Runt, the youngest pup of Kate and Humphrey, and their only Omega pup, had gone through the wolves' marriage ceremony with Princess—

—they'd been captured by rogue spies and taken back to Banff to become slaves. Things hadn't been as bad as they'd expected until Runt had mated with Princess, who had been in heat, and therefore able to get pregnant. Because they'd been found out by King, who had ordered no one to mate with is daughter before she'd been driven away, at first, including Runt, they'd been forced to compete in what was called "The Blood Sports" by the rogues. Although the new couple had been lucky to survive it, they weren't so lucky when they'd attempted to dig their way out of the cave they'd been held in as slaves. Princess had escaped, but she'd feared Runt had been killed by the rogues who'd been sent at them by King and Queen.

Princess had returned to Jasper Park alone and covered in, she'd assumed, Runt's blood, only to learn that Sweets (a Western Omega), Nars (a Northern Alpha, and the widowed father of Fleet and Magril), and Ed (a Northern Alpha, and a once good friend of Nars's children) had been killed in a bloody battle against thirty rogue wolves from Banff. Kate had got insane when Princess told her about Runt's possible death, but he'd turned out to be alive sometime later, explaining how he'd blacked out and slaughtered the attacking rogues without giving them a chance to fight back. It had been the blood from one of them that had gotten all over Princess, not the blood of Runt.

In the second to last battle with the rogues, when they'd invaded Jasper in full force, Queen, the Alpha female of Banff and King's mate, was killed by Princess, Runt, Lilly, and the former rogue, Melissa. They'd torn her to pieces and, after King had found her body, he'd ordered his pack to retreat, and Queen's death had put an end to all the fighting for that night. But, in the morning, the rogues had attacked again, and Scar, an Eastern Beta and the mate of his fellow Eastern Beta Claws, was killed. Claws, who'd been wounded early in the final battle, witnessed Scar's death from a cave she'd been recovering in. Only recently had she informed their six children—Dahlia, Kara, Christina, Jordon, Justin, and Scar—of his death and how he died. They'd cried themselves to sleep that night and it'd been a poor night of sleep for all seven of them—the six adolescent wolves and their widowed mother.

But Claws got her vengeance before the final battle was over. Soon as she'd recovered enough to fight, she'd given a new meaning to the phrases "bloody murder" and "there's gonna be Hell to pay." Her actions had looked like something straight out of a horror movie, as humans called them, with how bad she'd slaughtered the rogues. All of the rogues who'd killed Scar were the first ones Claws had gone after and she'd killed them all in an almost hellish fashion. There was very little left of any of them when she was done. It was remarkable she'd been able to do what she'd done on her own and considering how she'd been injured by the same rogues earlier, only saved by Scar rather than torn to pieces like he'd been. The best thing to happen in that battle, save for Claws going on an ax-crazy killing spree, was that King had been killed by Princess, Runt, Melissa, and others. His death had caused the end of the short war between the Banff and Jasper wolves and the deaths of many more rogues who'd retreated, thinking they'd be safe, only to end up plummeting to their deaths off the cliffs not far from the battle field.

Of the two-hundred fifty rogues who'd attacked Jasper on that day, only forty of them had made it past the cliffs south of the battlefield alive. No. The Jasper wolves hadn't killed two-hundred ten of them, but only seventy rogues. The other one hundred forty rogues had died due to their own ignorance by running toward the cliffs they'd known were they and falling to their deaths by broken necks, broken backs, broken hips. And even bodies that had literally broken in half because some rogues had landed on boulders that had shattered their spines to the point of snapping some wolves like twig.

In the year and four months since what had come to be called "The War for Jasper" by all of the wolves, who'd fought in it, the lives of the Jasper Wolf Packs have been much more peaceful. The wolves were able to go all over their territory without the threat of rogues, who hadn't been seen in almost a year-and-a-half since the war ended except for the two former rogues Princess and her old friend Melissa.

"Ah…yeah," a she-wolf moaned in a relaxed tone. "This is the life!" It was Claws, who had all but gotten over Scar's murder from a year-and-a-half ago. She hadn't forgotten his death or forgiven the rogues for making her a widow, but she wasn't contemplating causing her own death as she had. She'd learned she was pregnant after the war had ended and that had given her a reason to go on living until the puppies were born. But when the six of them had been born, she'd thought if would've been cruel to leave them orphaned. After all, Scar was dead, and if she'd killed herself, they'd had no mother to raise them all. Her daughters Dahlia, Kara, and Christina were setting at the other end of the pond, talking about something their mother couldn't hear.

Claws and many other female wolves were at the mid-level elevation of The Howling Rock, the name of a special mountain where wolves of the four packs meet to socialize, dance, and howl under the moon at an event called "The Moonlight Howl." She'd met Scar at one when she was her children's age, but she'd never met another wolf there. At least she wouldn't howl with or marry another wolf. She'd only loved Scar as an adolescent wolf, and now that she was a widow, she was going to stay a widow until the day she died. Even after his death, Claws would be a loyal mate to Scar by refusing to have even a one-night stand with another male, or even touch one inappropriately. She wouldn't even if she'd gotten drunk on too many fermented berries. Nothing would make her mate with another wolf, whether he was her new mate or not.

"No war!" Claws continued. "No rogue wolves to worry about and no feuding with other wolf packs! Everything is so perfect and peaceful it couldn't get any better!"

The other female wolves were shocked that Claws could be this calm and soft-spoken. She normally spoke in a harsh voice and sounded like she was growling all the time, but now, her voice was about as calm as Eve's voice was. Eve was the former Alpha female of the Western Wolf Pack before it had united with the Eastern Wolf Pack who was still known for her ax-crazy threats and her "mama bear" personality. Her most memory one was when her pack had been confronting the Eastern Pack Wolves when Kate, the former Alpha female, replaced by her youngest son's mate, Princess, had gone missing. It was something to the likes of: "If any of you wolves have hurt my daughter, I will personally RIP out your eyes, and SHOVE them down your throat so you can see my claws TEAR YOUR CARCASS OPEN!" Eve was usually a nice, sweet mother, but she came with an unusually violent preference of solutions. If some so much as hinted that one of her children, step-children, or grandchildren were in trouble, or, heaven forbid, for the wolf or wolves who caused it, dead...nice knowing him, her, or them. Claws and Princess, the former rogue slave who'd warned the Jasper wolves of her old pack's intentions, and now the Alpha female and dominant wolf of the Eastern and Western Wolf Packs, were the same way.

Claws and Princess were the kind of wolves who no one angered and got away with it. And if someone hurt _any_ of their relatives, those two females would raise Hell on Earth for whoever did it. And that Hell would be so much worse if it was one of their children who were hurt or killed. And if it were murder…then those two would turn into murderers themselves and give a new meaning to such a dark word.

"Yes, I agree," another female, called Candy, short for Candice, said. Candy was an Omega wolf from the Western Pack who'd proven useful in the first of several battles with the rogues. After her best and oldest friend, Sweets, who'd also been a Western Omega, was killed by a rogue, Candy had lost her mind and killed a rogue who'd been about to kill Claudette, the only daughter and the oldest pup of Kate and Humphrey, the former pack leaders before Princess and Runt had succeeded them. On that day, she'd proven that, despite having such a sweet name—literally—she wasn't the sweet wolf her pack had known to be for most of her life. Her mate was Mooch, another Western Omega wolf, whom she was pregnant with the puppies of. No one could tell because her belly hadn't grown large yet, but she'd made it known recently that she would soon be a mother.

Princess and Runt, although not present among all these female wolves, were already proud parents of three healthy wolf pups. Although they couldn't be called wolf pups anymore. They'd reached the adolescent stage of their life and Terra, the oldest and the only daughter, was beginning to take an interest in boys. That was what she and the three daughters of Claws were actually talking about now when they heard laughing, shouting, and screaming from the hills just over a cliff that blocked the view of the large pond.

"Oh, dear, I'm gonna die!" a female voice shouted from the hill as a loud scraping sound was heard by the females in the pond, all of whom gasped with shock. Many of them ducked into the water when a log board shot right over the pond, with two male wolves in it hollering excitedly as the female between them was screaming in terror. "OH, I'M GONNA DIE! I'M GONNA DIE! I'M GONNA DIE! I'M GONNA DIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEE! LET ME OFF THIS WILD RIDE BEFORE I GET SPLATTERED LIKE A BUG!"

The two males were Humphrey and his son Stinky, an Alpha and the middle child, and Stinky's mate Mica, a former Southern Pack Alpha who'd joined the Western Wolf Pack and married Stinky just to get away from her cruel parents who'd arranged marriages for all of their children. The oldest of her siblings had joined the Western Pack for the same reason in the past year-and-a-half, and they still were. Mica was one of seventeen puppies born to her parents a few years back.

"That's Mica!" Magril, the orphaned little sister of Fleet, Claudette's mate, cried. "I hope she's alright!"

"I'm far from alright!" she cried. Mica screamed when the log board suddenly crashed into the ground not far from the pond, while Humphrey and Stinky were letting out joyous hollers. "Okay, now I'm alright that I got off that wild wide! I'm not going to do that ever again!" she added, trying to shake off her fear.

"At least you lived a little for once!" Stinky said excitedly, lying on his pack and laughing his head off. "I've never see you have so much fun in the almost two years we've been together!"

"If that's fun, I want to be a boring wolf!" Mica yelped, and then jumped into a pond, sending a lily pad up into the air. It landed on top of Mica's gray head, covering one of her eyes up like hair. She could see all the other wolves laughing at her from the one eye that wasn't covered up. She ducked into the water, up to her chin, her cheeks blushing red as a tomato with embarrassment.

* * *

**Author's note:** I know I just started _Alpha and Omega: The Battle for Jasper Park_, but I decided to do something different, and after talking with a friend about horror movies, I decided to take a break from normal and zombie stories to work on something I've never done before. The plot'll make more sense by chapter 3, which will be the forth chapter if you count the prologue (this) as a chapter.


	2. A Day in the Life of Claws

**Chapter 1**

**A Day in the Life of Claws**

Claws had just made sure Dahlia, Kara, Christina, Jordon, Justin, and Scar, the six fatherless children of her and Scar, were sound asleep before she went off to the side of the den to think about the rough life she'd had.

She was born in the Eastern Wolf Pack's Territory, which was now abandoned, in the middle of the famine and the disease that had been plaguing it, and had cost the lives of many wolves. Her father was among them. He'd died shortly after she was born, when her eyes were still closed tight, she was deaf, and had no fur on her body. She was one of five puppies born to her mother. Because of the disease spreading through the Eastern Wolf Pack's Territory back then, Claws's mother had been paranoid about letting her five children even go to the mouth of the den. There'd been so many wolves dying in the clearing right outside her mother's den back then that even the then puppies had sensed something was wrong. Just that their mother rarely had let them out of their den. The truth was that there hadn't been that serious of a disease spreading, so long as contact with the bodies of the diseased was avoided at all costs. It had been only contagious through physical contact of any kind, not through the air. It couldn't be breathed in. In short, if they avoided the corpses, the biggest danger was just a major annoyance. That was the stench of the bodies rotting flesh. Thankfully, their mother had been told that by their former pack healer, or she wouldn't have let her children out of the den ever.

Claws and her four siblings, two younger than her and two older than her, were orphaned when they were only a year old. Their mother had fallen ill after inadvertently consuming the flesh of a rotting caribou. She'd thought it was a recently deceased caribou, only to learn different days later when she'd constantly felt ill to the point of vomiting multiple times a day. She'd eat something good for her then puke it up minutes or hours later. Their mother's health had quickly declined until she couldn't control any of her bodily functions and she'd died by suffocation. Her lungs had shut done, something that caused their mother's death.

The five one-year-old wolves had been orphaned until they found themselves reaching their adolescence, and they'd lived with each other in the entire year after their mother's deaths. None of the adult Eastern Pack Wolves had wanted to take Claws or her four younger siblings in, so they'd kept each other safe. And they'd learned how to do that by watching the same adults take care of their own children. But seeing that had made the five orphans extremely anger, wanting to ask those parents how they could take care of one pup, but turn away from orphans when they were wolves raising litters of more than ten puppies! But they hadn't said that, knowing it would've been rude of wolves who'd been taught better by their parents before passing away. They shouldn't be rude to other adult wolves now that they were orphans just because they'd been turned away by so many families who didn't have many, or any, wolf pups to take care of.

And just because Claws and her siblings had become adolescents didn't mean their struggles had ended. When they'd been invited to go on a hunt with some of the older wolves, they hadn't expected a stampede of caribou to happen. While Claws and the next three oldest of her siblings had escaped to the side of the valley unharmed, the youngest of the five orphans hadn't. He'd been trampled to death by the caribou herd. That was the first time Claws had cried in her life and she wouldn't again until the battle for Jasper when Scar was killed by the rogues. The only good thing they'd learned in that moment was that their little brother had died instantly. While they were a bit comforted about him not suffering, they'd still wanted him to be alive again. Claws felt the same way now.

It was at the funeral of Claws's little Alpha brother that she'd met Scar and they become good friends the same day. He'd consoled her, doing what her own siblings hadn't been able to do because they'd been morning as much as she had been. Not long after, they'd fallen in love, began dating, and then become hunting partners on the hunting team of the Eastern Wolf Pack. They'd proven to be better hunters than anyone else on their hunting team was and had quickly risen in rank until they were the leaders of the hunting team. Scar was the only wolf Claws had loved in her life up to his death and she hadn't loved anyone before meeting him. They'd worked so well together and never failed on a hunt together until they'd been sent by Tony to catch a caribou, inadvertently ruining Kate's first hunt, and getting involved in conflict with Hutch, Candu, and other wolves who'd been hunting with Kate. They probably would've killed each other if it hadn't been for Humphrey acting as the peacekeeper, as was expected of all Omegas, and then Winston's sudden appearance. He'd ordered his hunting team to return home, ignoring Claws and Scar until they'd snarled at Candu, who'd been wounded by Claws. Winston had yelled "NOW!" at Claws and Scar, and they'd returned to the Eastern Territory whimpering.

And when Tony had taken all of his Alphas and Betas to the border of his and Winston's territory because Kate had apparently stood Garth up, Claws had been there, about to jump over the river, and tear some throats out. But when Eve had threatened to "tear out their eyes, shove them down their droves so they could see her tear their carcasses open," she'd backed off, as did many other of her fellow pack members, including Garth and Tony.

When Claws had learned about Tony's death, she'd probably been the happiest wolf in Jasper, unlike Garth—Tony's only surviving pup of his litter—obviously. She'd never said anything about it to Garth, but Claws had always hated Tony's guts. Her hatred of Tony had boiled over when he'd almost caused Kate's death by declaring war on the Western Wolf Pack. She and Scar had always thought Tony's hate of the Western wolves was unreasonable. They'd gotten sick of hearing all his talk of Alphas being better than Betas and Omegas because they were Betas themselves. Tony had talked about it so much (even when his pack's Betas and Omegas had been around) that it'd gotten offensive to wolves such as Claws and Scar. Although she was happy that Tony was dead, it angered her that her young mate was murdered before he'd did! Not only was it wrong that a younger wolf died before an older one, she felt that Tony didn't deserve to live longer than Scar had! That was dumber, she thought, than anything Tony had ever believed or said about Beta and Omega wolves.

Claws had been depressed after Scar was murdered by at least five different Banff rogues and even suicidal until she'd discovered her own pregnancy. She hadn't been aware that she'd been in heat—the only time a she-wolf could get pregnant—when she'd mated with Scar. And she'd only accidentally mated after she'd gotten drunk from eating far too many fermented berries on that she'd mated with him. That was probably the best accident that ever happened in her entire life. She would've killed herself if she hadn't mated with Scar that not because her pregnancy was why she hadn't. If she'd died, her unborn puppies would've, too. That alone had raised Claws's spirits. And when she'd given birth, with the help of Candy and Eve, she'd dropped the idea of killing herself entirely. There wasn't anything more selfish, Claws thought, than ending her own life when she had six newborns to raise take care of. And she wouldn't ever end her old left even when they were adults. She didn't plan on dying until she was an old wolf and was lying on her deathbed, surrounded by her children, and possibly her grandchildren by that point. Claws still had a long life ahead of her and she had no reason to end it. She had more reasons to let it go on than to end it now. She'd been orphaned and would be damned if she would let her children go through the same Hell she'd gone through because Tony hadn't wanted to put his differences with the Western Wolf Pack aside.

_And look at where that's gotten the old bastard_, Claws thought cruelly. _Six feet under the ground! Just what a cruel wolf like him deserves. Wolves like Tony and those damned rogues who murdered my dear Scar don't deserve to be born! At least their all burning forever, though. I hope I never see any wolves like them again. It would drive you insane to put have another wolf like Tony around. At least Garth hasn't grown up to be like him! I'd want him dead, too!_

Claws wasn't saying this aloud because none of her now sleeping children had ever heard her curse before, and she wasn't going to let them hear her curse when they were still so young. They were hardly adolescents and still not old enough to leave their den. Not even Dahlia, the oldest, who was named for a song that had been fitting for Claws's depressed phase of life after Scar was murdered. It was "Black Dahlia" by a band called Hollywood Undead, not that she knew the name of the group or the song by listening to it. The words "Black Dahlia" were never used in the song. She'd seen a poster for the song on a window when she'd been wandering around the gas station across the large river. And she'd heard the song playing because the door had been left open on that hot summer day when she'd been contemplating suicide before Eve had told her she was pregnant.

Claws never had thought about the chance of being pregnant until she'd had odd cravings for more food than she normally ate and would have mood swings if she didn't get the amount of food she wanted. She'd, figuratively speaking, although she could, literally, do it if she was angry enough, bitten someone's head off for not bring her what she'd requested. Claws had once asked an Eastern Pack Alpha wolf to fetch a good amount of caribou meat for her. And what'd he get her? A bunch of fish! He'd claimed that he couldn't find any caribou meat in the Western Wolf Pack's territory! What kind of ignorant excuse was that?! No caribou in the Western territory?! Claws had never heard such a stupid combination of words out of another wolf's mouth in her life until that moment! There was no need to repeat what she'd said to him, but he'd been scared for his life, and had ran out of her den with the fish. He knew she would've killed him if he'd left them behind. So he'd not been so lazy next time and brought her more caribou than she'd wanted to make up for his laziness. Of course, he hadn't told her that he'd been lazy and she would've eaten wolf meat on that night! Claws had been on the verge of eating dead wolves during the famine, the ones that had just died and therefore not diseased with rot. She'd thought about how cannibalism would've been a better option than starvation, as had Scar.

Claws and Scar had survived on the family of rats that they'd shared a cave with just for the food source, not to be nice. Otherwise, they would've driven those damn rodents out long ago or slaughtered them faster than they could've reproduced. But, unfortunately, the supply of rats had run out after only a few weeks into the sudden famine, and they'd starved again for another few weeks before the two wolf packs had united under new leadership—Kate and Humphrey. That'd been the best thing to ever happen to Claws and Scar in their entire lives. Kate and Humphrey being the pack leaders had made the lives of all the Eastern and Western Pack Wolves so much better than before. And now that Princess and Runt were the pack leaders, the lives of Claws and all the other wolves in her pack were so much better than when Kate and Humphrey were the pack leaders. Where Kate and Humphrey had left off improving their lives, Princess and Runt had taken over and gone many steps further, doing things their predecessors had never thought to do before their early retirement. Their reason for given up their positions of pack leaders was they'd had enough after the short war with Banff.

Claws sighed. _I think it's time I got some shut up,_ she thought, and curled up with her six children, then began snoring.


	3. Kate's Drunken Encounter

**Chapter 2**

**Kate's Drunken Encounter**

Kate was absolutely wasted…drunk, plastered, or stoned…whatever word fit the best for having just snarfed so many fermented berries, her favorite snack. She'd just won a fermented berry-eating contest, up against Claws, Princess, Runt, Humphrey, Lilly, Garth, Candu, Hutch, and a few other adult wolves. Humphrey and Runt hadn't lasted long before passing out drunk. Lilly, Candu, and Hutch weren't much better off, and Runt had been disqualified because he'd gotten sick and ran off to puke his guts up. As for Claws and Princess, they'd eaten more than they could handle and passed out. That left Kate as the winner, but she'd eaten so many fermented berries that she couldn't even walk a crooked line right, let alone a straight line. And she was probably going to pass out any time now.

She was at the river near the border of the Eastern and Western Territories, slurping water up from the river with her tongue. The only reason she was drinking so much water was to try to stop from passing out. Water was a good way for wolves, who'd eaten far too many fermented berries, to avoid passing out and even helping with some of the symptoms of being plastered, an informal term for being extremely drunk. She would've passed out fifteen minutes ago if it weren't for all the water she'd drank. Kate's mouth was so dry she couldn't bear to do anything but slurp up the ice-cold water from the river. She was so obsessed with drinking the water that she didn't care about the scent of another wolf hitting her nose. That was mainly because she was drunk, and not in her right mind because of the juice of all the fermented berries she'd eaten, and that she just wanted to sober up enough to get back to her den to sleep this off.

Kate paid no attention to the footsteps of the wolf who came into view. He was a dark brown wolf with lighter brown eyes and he appeared to be about as muscular as Garth was, maybe a bit more. He stood there, watching Kate as if he knew who she was, or something, for the next ten minutes until she was content with all the water she'd drank.

Kate turned around, intending to leave and back to her den to sleep, but was stunned to see this wolf. She recognized him almost immediately, regardless of the fact she was extremely drunk.

"Dakota!" Kate gasped in a drunken tone. "You're alive!"

Kate was referring to how this wolf before her had disappeared when after she'd met him at Alpha school. She'd met him on their first day there and had begun dating him almost immediately, but then he'd vanished without a trace a week later during a tracking exercise. Winston, Kate's father, had ordered the wolves to go off on their own and bring back each of the pinecones he'd hidden throughout the camp where Alpha school was held for the entire winter. All of the wolves had returned with each of the pinecones except for one who didn't return at all. Because he'd known how much Kate had loved Dakota, an Alpha, and he'd seen how much his daughter had been panicking, Winston sent all of the wolves he'd been teaching to find Dakota. They spent the entire day using what they'd learned about tracking in the past week to try and find him, but Dakota was never seen again. No signs of him having been killed or wounded were found, not even by Kate or her father, until they found a massive hole in the ground that his trail seemed to have just disappeared into. Garth had been the oldest of the student Alphas and he'd found a way into the hole in the ground without getting hurt. He'd found blood in that underground cave and had gotten out of there immediately, telling them he'd found blood and it smelled like Dakota's. Garth had know what his blood smelled like because Dakota had been scratched up by a thorn bush on their third day of train and Garth had gotten Dakota's blood in his nostrils.

"I never died," Dakota said. He wasn't too surprised that his old girlfriend was drunk, assuming she'd eaten too many fermented berries for her own good…again.

"Then what happened…" she slurred, "that caused—" Kate hiccupped loudly. "—you to disappear for over three years?"

"I was hurt badly when I fell into that hole in the ground," her old boyfriend explained, "before I'd even found the pinecone your father had sent us all to find. I'd crawled away, expecting to die, before any of you could find me, but I recovered after some Southern Pack Alphas and their three Omega children found me." Kate assumed he was talking about Mica's parents and her siblings who hadn't fled the Southern Territory because their parents had arranged forced marriages yet. "I would be dead if it wasn't for them. I can't remember the Omegas' names, but the two Alphas names were Griffin and Banja, I believe."

Kate, only because of being so drunk she'd basically forgotten she was married to Humphrey and had three puppies with him, asked, "Do you have to make up for lost time?"

"How so?" Dakota was confused. "Wait, aren't you married now?"

"Married? I'm still single!" That was the fermented berries' temporary affect on her memory talking.

Dakota decided just to go with it, knowing how foolish it was to argue with a wolf who was as drunk as Kate was. He decided to try again. "Make up for lost time how?"

Kate licked her lips, which were stained blue with fermented berry juice. She was eyeing the crotch of her former boyfriend with lust. She was sure that Dakota was big down there and she wanted to taste it, since they'd never gotten around to that before he'd disappeared. And they'd never mated when they were together. She'd be shocked by her actions when she sobered up because she'd realized she was cheating on Humphrey, whom she couldn't even remember marrying because she was so drunk.

Dakota was shocked at first when Kate put her head between his legs and began licking him with her tongue, but he decided to go with it soon.

"Lick my knot and balls, Kate…" Dakota moaned. "Yes!" On a wolf's body, a knot referred to a part their reproductive track that was located on their dick, and was forced inside the female when the male reached his climax. It was used so the female couldn't get away as he filled her up with his fluids. It guaranteed he got her pregnant, if that female was in heat, by not letting her get away without dragging him with her, or hurting him. The female who was knotted, as it was called, knew enough not to pull herself away because she could hurt the male mating with her and even hurt herself if she tried to get away. Only the male half of a mating couple could remove his knot form a female. She was powerless if they mated in the doggy style position. It was impossible for a female to get knotted if she rode the male she was mating with.

Kate put Dakota's dick in her mouth, began bobbing her head up and down, as she sucked on him.

"Use that Alpha mouth and suck my…oh…yeah…" he moaned, and then stopped briefly because of the pleasure. "Oh…yes, baby! Suck it hard!" he added with a louder moan. This was not as good as he'd expected a blowjob to feel like. He'd expected it to feel better, but he got an idea in his head that would make it feel as good as he'd expected it to.

"Suck on the tip of it, too, Kate," he said a minute later. Kate mumbled something he couldn't understand—she couldn't speak with eleven inches of dick in her mouth—then lifted her head up to suck on the tip of his. Dakota swore he could hear her sucking on the tip. "Aww yes!" he cried with pleasure as he fell on his back. "Just like that…" he moaned. "Now put the entire think in their mouth…I want to feel the tip in the back of your throat…"

Kate knew her ex-boyfriend was telling her to deep throat him and she had no problem with that. It wasn't like she hadn't deep throated before. She'd done it twice in her life. Once to Garth when she'd gone to The Howling Rock to meet him, before he'd scared her off with his once terrible howl and to Humphrey after she'd married him. That was during the time the rogues were attacking Jasper, shortly before Princess and Runt had been taken to Banff by the rogues. Her throat had handled Garth's eleven inches down her throat, so she could handle Dakota's eleven inches. Kate was sucking on his dick, with her tongue wrapped around it so it wouldn't get scratched by her knife-like teeth, as she felt the tip of it poking her throat. A wolf who was Kate's age had a muzzle that was about seven inches, so that meant she had four inches down her throat. It caused her to gag, but her ex-boyfriend wanted her to deep throat him, so that's what she was going to do to him. And if he wanted her to swallow, then she'd swallow everything. She'd swallow more than four inches of his dick if he wanted her to!

"You suck dick so good!" Dakota cried. "Soak it with your saliva, Kate. Lube me up for when we mate!"

Kate complied again. Although she was still deep throating him, she was moving her tongue around his dick in such a way that soaked it—no, coated it—in her saliva. She didn't stop, however, just because she'd coated it. She wanted his dick to look like it was drooling, so she'd have to coat it really thick with her saliva. She'd have to leave it entirely wet and have every inch of it dripping wet so he'd slip right into her if he were being serious about them mating.

"I'm surprised you can fit my dick all the way in your mouth," he said about two minutes later. "Keep it up…"

To please him, even though it made her throat sore, Kate picked up the speed at which she forced her head up and down. She couldn't force her head any lower and felt his knot against her chin every time her head went down. Dakota hadn't expected her to do this, since he knew he would give her a sore throat, but he was glad she had. He couldn't stop himself from saying what he did next.

"Yes! Faster!" he almost begged. "I know you love sucking me off…"

Kate mumbled something about how his dick taste, but he couldn't understand her due to having eleven inches of dick stuck in her mouth. The four inches in her throat made it even less possible for her to speak.

Dakota knew what the feeling he had was and it didn't surprise him that he was about to reach his "grand finale" because of how Kate had been deep throating him. The speed at which she was bobbing her head also played a good role of that. If she hadn't been deep throating him or thrusting her head so quickly, he'd still have a few more minutes left.

"I hope you like cum cause your about to get a lot of it!" her warned Kate, but his warning seemed to make her thrust her head faster. She wanted his semen simply because of how good she thought Humphrey's tasted, not that she could remember blowing him because he was her mate, and how much Garth's had tasted since he was an Alpha. She was sure Dakota's would be the best she'd ever tasted, even though she'd only done this twice before meeting Dakota again.

Dakota screamed suddenly as he climaxed in Kate's mouth. Of course, most of his semen sprayed down his throat since his dick had been crammed down in when he'd climaxed. But since she could taste it as it flowed down her throat, she was content with his climax. And she'd been correct. His fluids tasted better than Garth's had and definitely better than Humphrey's had, since he was an Omega. She was thinking about how Alphas had bigger dicks than Omegas did and how their fluids tasted better, too.

Her ex-boyfriend let Kate know that his climax was over, but when she released it from her jaws, his dick sprayed the last of his load all over her brown face. He'd only said that so he could give her what was called a facial. His semen dripped down off her face, as she licked it off her lips. It was warm and sticky, she thought, and tasted very sweet. He must've eaten a lot of berries, or something that was sweet, before hand, because she knew how it should've been very salty. It was naturally salty, and usually more so because wolves normally ate caribou meat more than berries. She assumed he must've been expecting a blowjob or it was just coincidence.

Kate didn't move from the position she was in, on her belly, with her head close to his crotch as the last of his fluids squirted onto her face. And then, when he was done giving her a seminal facial, Kate didn't move as Dakota got behind her, and stuck his dick in her relatively tight pussy. He began thrusting and Kate moaned. She'd wished they'd fucked when they'd been dating. And she still didn't remember how she was married and was a mother

"Oh yes…you definitely have an Alpha pussy," Dakota complimented her. It's so wet and tight."

"Take me and fuck me Dakota!" Kate cried with pleasure. ""Pound me Dakota! Make me your bitch!"

Dakota thrusted in and out of her so hard that it made Kate cry all sorts of things she normally wouldn't say. She said them in a matter of seconds, not giving her ex a chance to speak until she was done.

"Yes! You're so huge! Pound me harder!"

"Mmm! That's it! Pound my Alpha pussy! Faster!"

"DEEPER! Oh, yes! Just like that! Ooohhh…so big!"

"Fill me up! Oh yes!"

"Ohh…yes. That's it. Keep fucking me."

With each of these phrases, Kate's voice intensified until she was shouting because of the pleasure, and then screaming. She'd never screamed like this when Humphrey mated with her. This was the best she'd ever felt during a round of mating before.

"Go as fast as you can! Please!" Kate screamed when she saw Dakota try to speak, but he spoke when she was done screaming that.

"Take it Kate! Take it like an Alpha!" he commanded her. "You're so hot…I love pounding you." Kate orgasmed and that prompted Dakota to say, "Oh…you're so wet, Kate! Wetter than my spit-soaked dick!"

"Now it's cum soaked!" Kate commented. "Soaked with my cum and your cum after that dick job I gave you!" Then she began, rather unreasonably, shouting, "Cum in me! Soak my womb with cum!" The reality was that his climax was many minutes away and he wouldn't flood her womb until then.

Kate didn't expect what happened next. Dakota bit her neck, using his fangs, the sharpest teeth in a wolf's mouth, and drew blood. Kate didn't mind until she noticed how he didn't release the grip on her neck. It actually felt as if she was sucking on her throat! She assumed he was just necking her but she felt as if her blood was leaving her body.

"Your blood tastes so good, my dear!" Dakota said in a dark voice as he thrusted in and out of her.

Kate didn't react because he forced his knot into her even though his climax was still minutes away.

"Your knot is huge!" she'd cried before he'd knotted her. "Please knot me!" was what Kate had said that had provoked him to knot her before climaxing, but now they couldn't mate because he'd done that. "AGH! ITS IN!"

"And now my fangs are in your neck!" Dakota growled. "And I'll drink you dry!"

Kate, despite still being drunk, gasped. "What?!"

"You haven't figured it out yet?" he asked loudly. "I knotted you so I could do this!" And then he sank his two front fangs back into Kate's neck. She felt her blood leaving her body, as if it was going into his fangs!

"What are you?!"

"Your killer!" Dakota said in an entirely different voice. It was louder…eviler. "Now say good back to your throat!" And then he tore it out, giving himself plenty of Kate's blood to drink, as her head collapsed in a pool of it.

* * *

**Author's Note:** If anyone doesn't figure it out after this chapter, this is going to be a vampire story. I'll just say it now so it's even clearer than Dakota talking about drinking Kate's blood.

And even though it was mentioned repeatedly throughout the chapter, I'll explain why Kate did all this with another male. She's so drunk after that fermented berry eating contest to repeating that she has a mate or children. She wouldn't intentionally cheat on Humphrey. But I guess it doesn't matter now since she's dead.

I changed the name of this chapter from "Kate Remembers" to "Kate's Drunken Encounter" because that first title didn't really fit anymore after I changed the entire idea for this chapter. Originally, she was supposed to remember Dakota and not mate with him until he fed her fermented berries, but I changed it to something that would make more sense. (Having Kate so drunk she doesn't even remember having a mate or three children who have mates.)


	4. Blood in the Water?

**Chapter 3**

**Blood in the Water?**

Claws was at the river that flowed from the one separating the abandoned Eastern Territory from the Western Territory. She was there because her six children had wanted to go to it and play in the water. Lighthearted moments like this were what reminded Claws of how peaceful everything was since King and Queen were killed and all of the rogues had retreated back to Banff. Still, there wasn't a day that went by she didn't miss Scar. She'd always miss him and so her would children, even if they never knew him.

As Claws was lying on her back on a soft patch of grass, sunning herself, she didn't hear anything that was going on. Her six children were splashing water at each other and swimming around to avoid being caught by Dahlia, who was it in their game of "water tag," a difficult twist on the normal version of tag that was played on land. They had to stay in the river at all times and try to avoid being caught by whoever was it. If they went out of the water, then they were automatically it rather than the wolf who was it, if he or she were still in the water.

Dahlia was about to tag Christina, the second oldest, when they noticed something red flowing through the water, leaving a pinkish color in its wake. They froze immediately, realizing it was blood. Blood! When the six pups regained their wits, after the bloody water had flowed past them, staining their fur red, they dashed out of the water, and over to their mother, almost screaming. Their mother awoke with a start and almost screamed herself when she saw the blood all over her children, on the ground, and in the river.

"Are any of you hurt?!" Claws gasped.

"No," Dahlia said in a shaking voice. "It's not our blood…it came from up river."

"The Eastern Territory?" their mother asked rhetorically. "I want you all to go to your aunt's den, where she'll clean you up and watch up you. Just play with Scarlet, your cousin, until I get back."

"Where are you going?" asked Scar, the youngest of the six Claws had named for their murdered father.

"I'm going to see what the source of the blood is, and then I'll be right back," Claws said. "I promise. I need to see what it is so I can tell Princess and Runt about this."

Claws arrived at the site where, unbeknownst to her, Kate had been killed by her ex-boyfriend, and had her blood drank by him. Claws's hackles, ears, and tail immediately rose when she saw a trail of blood leading to the river. There was a body in the river. As soon as she reached the riverbank, she recognized the body. It was Kate. Her throat was torn open and it seemed like something had punctured her jugular vein as if it'd drank her blood out of it. Claws only knew of a few animals that did such a thing—vampire bats, ticks, fleas, beg bugs, mosquitoes, weasels, stoats, assassin bugs, and some flies. But most of those didn't have teeth, and if they did, teeth that weren't big enough to do something like this. The only ones of those she knew of that could've done this were the weasels and the stoats. The rest were far too small. But, upon closer examination of Kate's mutilated throat and punctured jugular, he realized the teeth were far too large to be any type of rodent. They were—

_Wolf teeth!_ Claws thought in horror. _A wolf did this to Kate?! But why? And how? Wolves can't drink blood like weasels and stoats can! I-It makes no sense! I need to get out of here…but there's so much more I have to do first…oh, I hope I get this done fast. I don't want to stick around to find out what killed her!_

Claws turned to leave. And as she left, she was unaware of something watching her from amongst the trees. It was a wolf, but not the one who killed Kate. It wasn't Dakota. There was blood on his abnormally large fangs. He stepped out of the clearing, as it was dark enough out for him not need to worry about being burned up by the sunlight. The sun wasn't even out, nor was the moon, but it would be soon. And by then, he was gonna have some wolf blood to drink from an unaware victim…

* * *

**Author's note:** Future chapters will be longer than this. If I write short chapters like this, it's cause I feel like they don't need to be very long to get the point across.


	5. An Unseen Savior

**Chapter 4**

**An Unseen Savior**

Claws hadn't gone very far from the river where she'd found Kate's corpse when she began to get a bad feeling about something. She felt like she was being watched by something. Something evil. It was just one being, she assumed, but it was more evil than anything she'd ever been near in her life. Even more evil than the rogues were, as hard as that was to believe. She felt like it was following her from behind. It was getting darker out and that made her feel worse. Claws was sure her children were beginning to worry about her, even if they were with their aunt, who was Claws's sister, and their cousin Scarlet, an old friend of Mica's whose name came from her fur color. She had red fur—something that was very rare among wolves. It specifically the color scarlet, which was a bright orange-tinged red color. It was said that, on a dark night, or when she wasn't where the sun could shine, such as in a cave or in her den, that Scarlet, the wolf, glowed like the sun because of her scarlet-colored fur.

Claws still couldn't believe that Kate was dead, murdered by…who knows what! She could only assume that whatever evil presence she sensed was nearby had to be responsible. There weren't any wolves in all of Jasper Park who wanted Kate dead. The rogue wolves did, but they hadn't been seen in Jasper for over a year-and-a-half. And after how brutally King and Queen had been killed, they wouldn't dare come back unless they wanted to die the same way. And if they did come back, claiming that they wanted to join the Western or Eastern Wolf Packs, Claws was sure that Princess and Runt would probably have them killed if they can't prove their being truthful. Not to mention there was no way in Hell they could ever be sure if they could trust a rogue as a member of their pack. Princess was an exception because she'd actually proven herself loyal by saving Runt's life when he was only a puppy, keeping him safe during the final battle, and fighting that battle. Above, Princess and Melissa had both proven their loyalty to the Jasper wolves when they'd taken part in killing King and Queen, both, Princess's own parents, and their former pack leaders. That was the ultimate test of proving loyalty to another pack—knowing that their former pack leaders were pure evil and taking part in their killing them. And no one could forget how brutally they'd killed King and Queen.

Claws stopped in her tracks and she got extremely pissed off quickly. "Alright, who is following me?" she asked loudly. "Come on out or are you too chickenshit to show yourself to me?"

"We'll so who's chickenshit, bitch," a low voice said. It sent chills through Claws and gave her a feeling that it belonged to whatever evil she believed was in the area.

"Come on out, you fuck!"

"You'll regret saying that," the voice said again before a wolf with light gray fur, missing in patches, came out of the forest. The irises of his eyes were glowing fire red and his eyeballs were a bright yellow. Claws felt like she was staring into a fire as she stared into his eyes. She knew not to look into this odd wolf's eyes when he opened his mouth, revealing oddly oversized fangs. She'd never seen a wolf with fangs this and knew he was a—

"Vampire!" Claws screamed. "You're a vampire!"

"Yes!" the wolf snarled. "Now let me at your throat! I'm parched of blood! You look like a healthy wolf!"

"How about you let me at your throat so I can tear it open!" Claws countered, using this vampire wolf's words against him.

"You should know that won't kill me if you know what I am!"

Before Claws had a chance to react, she'd been tackled by this vampire wolf, who pinned her to the ground. And when she failed getting him off her, she was stunned and horrified. She could only assume that this vampire wolf had super strength or some shit like that. Otherwise, she would've thrown this fucker straight to Hell and back!

"What are you waiting for?!" Claws roared. "Just drink my blood and get it over with!"

That caused the vampire wolf to hesitate and his hesitation seemed to make Claws even angrier. She went into a vulgar rant soon as she noticed this wolf was hesitating. Why had he pinned her to the ground then was now afraid to kill her?

"Come on you goddamn motherfucking pussy...are you afraid to drink my blood that YOU'LL FUCKING CHOKE ON IT?! Listen to me you fucking shit bag...if you want to drink my blood, let me tear your dick off first, and shove it down your fucking throat then pull your entrails out your fucking tailhole. Then I'll try to put them back in FUCKING PLACE BEFORE I MURDER YOU!"

"So be it, you Beta _whore_," the vampire insulted her one last time before putting his fangs up to Claws's throat. She closed her eyes, blacked out, and felt nothing. Even with her eyes closed tight, she swore she heard a commotion going on right above her, the sound of flesh getting cut, something getting her head went. And then all was silent. When Claws didn't feel any pain after about a minute of not moving, after the commotion had ended, she re-opened her eyes to see the vampire was dead. He'd been decapitated by…well, Claws didn't know who or what, but at least she was safe now.

Claws stood up and realized there was blood all over the clearing, herself, and the dead vampire wolf. Blood was gushing out of the stump of a neck where his head had been only two or three minutes earlier. There was something sticking out of his broken ribcages, which his heart showed throat. It looked like a wooden stake or something and it had been buried deep into this wolf's heart. His head was impaled on another stack, which had been stuck into the ground next to a third stake that had something on it. It seemed to be a note or something like that. It was blowing in the cool night breeze.

Claws approached the stake with a note on it. She was seemingly relieved beyond belief that someone had saved her life. Obviously written by whoever had saved her, it was written in the blood of the vampire. The way it was written suggested that a wolf had done it with his own claws, after dipping them in the blood of this vampire wolf. There was plenty of it, considering the heart had been stabbed open with one of these wooden stakes.

It was written in the sparsely used written language of wolves, which all wolves knew fluently, even if it hadn't been used it many years. It was a random pattern of small paw prints and scribbled "letters." No wolves from the generation wolves such as Kate, Humphrey, and Claws belonged had ever used their written language even if they all knew all to read it, and write it, with their claws. The note read:

"Meet me in the forest outside the Western Pack's Territory tomorrow morning. Do NOT come out at night unless you want to be saved by me a second time. You got lucky this tell. I'll tell you what exactly is going on when you meet me. And I'll tell you how to stop it if you promise me this: admittance into your back so I can tell all of its members what's really going on. It's more than just the virus making some of your pack members sick. You'll find out who killed that she-wolf lying dead in the river, what he really is, and why. I'll also tell you everything that happened when that saved your life. Keep this note with you until you come to meet me and I'll destroy it so they don't know where it is."

The note wasn't signed with a name and that made Claws want to know who saved her life even more than she had before. He'd saved her life and didn't even identify himself? He was a hero in her mind, but what kind of hero refused to make leave his name? Especially after saving someone's life? Claws really wanted to know who this unknown wolf was, but she guessed she'd have to wait until tomorrow morning to meet her savior. If she didn't get killed off by another of what she thought were vampires before then!

Claws took the note off the stake, rolled it up, and then would carry it back to her den by the string attached to it. She knew not to put the paper part of the note in her mouth because that would ruin it. There was a map on the back with a blood-drawn line that probably led to where her savior wanted her to meet him. She could tell it was a map from the park rangers' station. No wolf could draw like that with his claws using a lot of berry juice and some vampire blood.

As she walked away from the bloody scene, after cleaning up in the part of the river that didn't have blood in it, she wondered if her unseen savior could really stop what was happening…


	6. Nytmen

**Chapter 5**

**Nytmen**

Claws was waiting for her savior in the forest he'd told her about in his letter. And it was in the morning, also as he'd told her in his letter. She assumed that was because her attacker was a vampire and vampires couldn't come out in the daylight or they'd be burned up by the sun's rays. So where was her savior and why was he wanting to meet her in a dark place like this? Wouldn't they be at risk of being attacked by other vampire wolves? There were at least two others out there since her savior had killed one of them. That left Kate, and whoever had killed her. Kate's killer was still alive and her body had disappeared by the time Claws had returned to the river. All that had been left of Kate was her blood. The bloody paw prints leading away from the river implied that Kate had returned to life as a vampire and left during the time Claws had been away from the river.

"Over here," she heard someone say. It was a deep male voice and it came from in the darkness of the forest.

Claws went over to where she heard the voice and she saw a wolf standing there in the darkness. "Why are you in there?" she asked. "Come on out if you want to speak to me."

"I can't," her savior said.

"Why on Earth not?"

"You can thank these damned vampires for that," he said, much to the confusion of Claws. "Let me explain," he said before Claws could ask him what he meant. "One year ago today, I was attacked by these vampires and bitten, even though I'd managed to kill all my attackers."

"Then why are you here and not one of them?"

"Something in my blood was able to fight off the infection and stop me from turning into a full-blown vampire," he went on, "but I am still part vampire because of it. While I have all the strength of a vampire, being half a vampire wolf, half a normal wolf comes with a few curses, too. The first is that I cannot go out in the sunlight and the second is, while not as often as full-blown vampires need to, I must drink the blood of the living every few days or I will die."

"At least come out into the open," Claws urged. "There's no sunlight out here. You'll be fine."

"For my sake, I hope you're right," he said in an almost snarling voice. He came into voice and didn't look like what Claws had expected him to. His fur was entirely black, except for his tail, which was white, and a white stripe going down his back along his spinal column. That white stripe went as far as his mane, which hung over one of his eyes. The way it hung over his eye reminded Claws of how Lilly used to wear her mane like that, except that this male wolf's mane was much shorter than Lilly's was.

Claws noticed his eyes now. They were much more different than the eyes of any living wolf she'd ever seen. The irises were red like fire and his eyeballs were yellow just like the eyes of her attack. That made her believe he was part vampire. But there was still one thing she wanted to know—

"What is your name?" Claws asked him.

"Nytmen," he said.

"What?"

"Say 'night,'" Nytmen instructed.

"Night…"

"Now say 'men.'"

"Men…"

"Say it together," he concluded.

"Night-men…" Claws said hesitantly. "Nytmen…" She got it right that time. "Now why have you brought me here, exactly?"

"So I could tell you what happened at the river side," Nytmen explained. "That female wolf…"

"Kate," Claws said.

"Kate…was killed by a vampire at the river side," he went on. "I saw the whole thing. He said his name was Dakota and that he was Kate's ex boyfriend who'd disappeared when she was still attending Alpha school. Well, she'd seemed to be so drunk she didn't remember having a mate or children and…"

"And what?" Claws asked impatiently.

"She blew him before mating with him," he said and Claws gasped with disbelief. "But he didn't finish mating with her before he bit her on the neck, tore her neck open, and drank her blood. I'm sure you're wondering why her body vanished by the time you returned to the river. Well, I'll tell you why. She returned to life, as a vampire, right after you left the river. I saw it happen."

"I-I can't believe she did that with another mate…" Claws stammered. "Did she cheat on Humphrey, her mate?"

"No," Nytmen said, much to Claws's relief. "She was so drunk she didn't know any better or remember having a mate or children," he repeated. "I still don't know how he's going to take this news."

Claws didn't want to talk about it anymore. "So who saved my life? Was it you or not?"

"Yes, it was me," he went on. "When you'd closed your eyes, I'd attacked that vampire wolf before he could bite you. And I decapitated him, left a stake in his heart, and left that pre-written note for you to read."

"How did you know how to kill that…vampire?" she asked Nytmen.

"Every since I was bitten," he explained, "I've been hunting them hoping that I would find a cure in the form of a certain vampire's blood, but I've had no luck. I've all but given up being cured of being 50% vampire and I just kill as many as I can every night. They never suspect me since I look and even smell like a vampire to them. They've never been able to tell me from the real thing in the past year I've been killing these vampire wolves. The two in Jasper Park aren't the only ones. I came from Banff, after hearing about vampires there, and after making sure there wasn't a single vampire left there. I've been following the vampire who'd infected this 'Dakota' for the entire year I've known about them. He started the vampire outbreak in Banff and my birthplace of Red Deer Park. Now, it seems that he's in Jasper Park. He must be killed here or we'll never stop him. I don't know where he'll go next once he's done all the damage he wants to in Jasper. There aren't any other parks he or I know of in Canada."

"Maybe he'd stay here?" Claws suggested.

"Well, he does have a queen now," Nytmen said.

"Who?"

"The wolf you call Kate," he said.

"What?!" Claws gasped. "Why would she marry these vampires' Alpha male?!"

"She is a vampire now," Nytmen explained, "and the first and the only female vampire wolf one in all of Jasper. That is why Dakota hadn't finished mating with Kate and just infected her. He knew that their 'Alpha male' would be pissed off if one of his followers got her pregnant. That's what he wants to do."

Claws almost puked at the thought of vampire wolves fucking. "Oh, the thought of vampire wolves mating, and having puppies, if we can call them that, makes me sick!"

"I feel the same way," Nytmen said. "And not just because of that. I am sick."

"Why?" Claws asked, cocking her head.

"Remember when I told you vampire wolves must drink the blood of the living to stay alive?" Nytmen reminded her. "Well, I haven't done so in three days and I don't so, I'll start dying."

"What are you saying?" she asked him.

"I need to drink two ounces of your blood," he said.

"What?" she gasped.

"I won't bite you," Nytmen said. "I swear. You're a strong wolf, but that makes no difference. I wouldn't intentionally infect any wolf with this disease. There doesn't need to be any more half vampire wolves like me."

"Fine," Claws growled. Using one of her own fangs, her four front teeth on the top and bottom of her jaws, which were her longest teeth, she cut a small gash into one of her front paws, and then lied on her back. "You're gonna seal this gash up when you're done!" she told him.

"I will," Nytmen said. He began licking her paw, after she allowed him to get next to her to lick it. That was much easier for both of them, so she wouldn't have to hold her paw up for the entire time. And he wouldn't have to keep his head in an awkward position to lick her paw. Nytmen was done licking Claws's blood from her paw within five minutes of starting. He used some leaves from the forest, per Claws's instructions, to seal up the small gash in her paw.

Nytmen wanted to see how far this wolf was willing to go before she stopped him, so he got on top of her, planting his muzzle against her lips. Claws's eyes were closed, but that had nothing to do with her not reacting to his kiss. He went a little lower and sucked on her neck, being careful not to bite her neck. He wasn't even going to let his fangs make contact with her neck.

Claws moaned as he sucked on her and ran his rough tongue along it. This wasn't any kind of sex, so she wasn't against it as long as he didn't penetrate her in any way. If it didn't go beyond licking, kissing, and sucking on her neck, then Claws wouldn't be angry with him. Of course, she wasn't going to admit that Nytmen's actions made her horny. That might be the case, but she wasn't going to let him penetrate her just because she was getting a bit horny. Claws was used to masturbating when her kids were away, so she would just masturbate later to rid herself of these horny feelings. She was glad being horny wasn't the same thing as being in heat. He'd probably fuck her if she were in heat. When a female wolf was in heat, she gave off strong pheromones that caused all the males in a pack to want to mate with her. A female's heat was also the only time she could get pregnant and it also guaranteed a pregnancy. If a female wolf in heat mated, there was no avoiding having puppies. The opposite was true if a female who wasn't in heat mated. There was no avoiding not having puppies.

Claws felt Nytmen move a bit lower down. He was now sucking on, kissing, and even licking her belly. She had no clue when he'd done that to her breast, the front part of her body, but he must've. Claws assumed that she must've blacked out when she'd thought about masturbating later to relieve her horniness. She'd probably do it in a river so her pussy wasn't quite as tight.

_Natural lubrication,_ Claws thought. _Just like cum. But I don't want that from anyone but Scar!_

Claws began to get uncomfortable when he went a little lower. He was getting closer to her crotch, as his tongue ran along the fur on her belly. Yet she kept her eyes closed, even when she swore she felt something running along and penetrating her pussy. It was a feeling like nothing she'd ever felt before. Scar had never eaten her out before he was murdered. Suddenly, it hit her. She knew what Nytmen was doing. He was eating her out!

"Motherfucker!" Claws roared, and then backed away from Nytmen, who had some of Claws's fluids on his muzzle. No, she hadn't orgasmed—_Thankfully! s_he thought angrily—on his face, but it was just some of her fluids he gotten on his face because his licking. "What the hell are you doing?!"

Nytmen felt bad all of a sudden, but he wanted to know why Claws didn't want to be eaten out when any other female would? "I'm sorry, is there something wrong?"

"You put your tongue in my pussy!" Claws was growling like a wolf possessed. "You don't do that unless you want your dick in my mouth! And not for the reasons you're thinking—I'd never suck another male off. I'd only put another male's dick in my mouth TO BITE THE FUCKING THING OFF, THEN SPIT IT OUT LIKE IT'S ABSOLUTE SHIT!"

"Another male?" Nytmen was confused by this statement and a bit horrified of this female.

"My murdered mate, Scar, is the only male I'd ever let eat me or eat myself!" Claws snapped, "even if we never did such a thing! We mated once when I was drunk on fermented berries, then that was it! And he was murdered a year ago by the rogues from Banff—you should've let those vampires kill them all when you were there! I promised myself and my children that I'd NEVER marry again because of how much I loved Scar!"

"I'm sorry, I didn't know," Nytmen said. "I wouldn't have gotten intimate with you at all if I'd known…I truly feel bad about doing anything other than what I'd say I would…"

"I had no problem with it until you tried to eat me," Claws growled. "But don't do any of them again, since it seems you can't control your urges like I can."

"Do you want to know all the ways to kill the vampires?" Nytmen intentionally changed the subject.

"Yes," Claws said. "They killed Kate, whom I'd been extremely close to in life, and I want to know how to kill everyone of them!"

"There is four ways to successfully kill the vampire wolves," he said. "The first is by impaling them through the heart by almost anything, but a wooden stake seems to be best suited for them. You can find almost anything in the cabin of a hunter who'd believed in vampires, and was killed by them. I took anything that'd looked like it would be useful and put in this empty bad that had been in his cabin. The second way to kill a vampire wolf is much more difficult. You'd have to get them out during the day and then get in the sunlight. They aren't stupid. You'd really have to tempt or angry them to get them to come out of the darkness of, say, a cave or this forest."

Claws started whimpering. "Don't worry," he told her. "There aren't any vampires here. And if there were, they wouldn't stand a chance. I'm sure you are away of that after what I did to that vampire that'd attacked you. The third way you're probably aware of. Vampires die immediately if you completely decapitate them."

"What's the forth way to kill them?" Claws asked.

"Holy water," he said. "But we're wolves. We don't have access to such a thing. And that human they killed didn't have any in his cabin that hadn't been destroyed by the vampires."

"So we'll have to resort to putting stakes through their hearts and cutting their heads off, I assume?" Claws asked.

"Yes," he said. "Now, is there any way you can get me to your den without me having to go through the sunlight?"

"Yes," Claws said. "The back entrance to my den is located right at the end of this forest. I normally keep it blocked off by a large rock, so if the vampires ever are there, I'll be safe because they'd never think to move it. But let's hurry before we get caught in this forest by those vampires. I don't know about you, but I don't want to get my throat torn open by a vampire like Kate did."

"They won't attack me," Nytmen said. "Most of them know I'm part vampire, so they don't harm me."

"Why?" Claws was confused again.

"If a vampire somehow drinks the blood of another vampire," Nytmen said, "it gets sick. Very sick. It'll make them vomit, their skin will burn off, they bleed from the eyes, and finally, they either explode or disintegrate. And I should tell you how the vampire infection spreads: while it takes only minutes to become a vampire if you are bitten—it's even faster if you are killed—it takes thirty minutes to turn into a vampire if you are scratched by one. But that's enough about vampires here. Let's talk more in your den, where we'll be safe."

* * *

**Author's note:** I forgot to add this until I read four new reviews on the story. Nytmen is not my character. Dawn walker wolf wanted me to use him in the story, so I did after we talked for a while and thought of a role for him.


	7. Claws's Other Side

**Chapter 6**

**Claws's Other Side**

Humphrey was depressed and the look on his face said it. As an Omega wolf, Humphrey was normally a happy-go-luck sort of wolf, but now Claws wouldn't know it. After she and Nytmen had returned to the Western Territory, the first thing Claws had done was find Humphrey, Runt, Claudette, and Stinky. She'd told them what happened to Kate. While his children had ran off in tears to find their mates, and hopefully some comfort, Humphrey had no mate to run to and had cried into Claws's breast. She'd told Nytmen to find Princess and Runt, tell them that she sent him with what she'd told him to tell the pack leaders about the situation. Hopefully they would believe it and not call him crazy. It was dark out now, so Nytmen had nothing to worry about.

"Oh," Humphrey wailed, "Kate! Kate…she's gone and I couldn't even tell her I loved her one last time or say goodbye! Who killed her, Claws?!"

"You won't believe it," Claws said in a voice that was calm for a wolf like her.

"Just tell me…"

"A vampire wolf," Claws said hesitantly. "And I have reason to believe that they…"

"What? That they what?" Humphrey pressed, thinking it couldn't get any worse.

"Mated," Claws said, causing Humphrey's jaw to hit the den floor. "I'd seen…fluids on and in Kate's open mouth, and all over her face…and it looked like something had been behind her, given how it'd looked like claws had dug into her butt…I didn't want to tell you this. It's bad enough I told you she was murdered and that she mated and blew her murder…"

"I know!" Humphrey wailed. "She's dead and I can't believe she cheated on me, too!"

Claws was shocked just that Humphrey, of all wolves, would assume that Kate would cheat on him just because she gave another wolf a blowjob and let him mate with her. That didn't mean cheating. What if Kate had been raped by the vampire, not willingly mated with him? If she'd been willing, then she must've been drunk went it happened. Claws remembered how drunken Kate had been acting after the fermented berry-eating contest, which Kate had won. She couldn't have been in her wrong mind after eating so many fermented berries in one setting and probably thought that wolf was Humphrey. That or she'd forgotten she even had a mate and children. Claws remembered how Kate had ignored Runt, Humphrey, Claudette, and Stinky when they'd tried to take her home. She'd claimed she didn't know or remember them. Humphrey must've forgotten about that, but Claws reminded him now.

"No! No!" Humphrey argued. "She wouldn't mate with another wolf unless she knew what she was doing! Kate would never be so drunk that she'd forgotten us by then! She cheated on me, I'm telling you, Claws! She cheated on me!"

"Stop it Humphrey!" Claws snapped. "She'd never cheat on you!"

"You don't know that!"

"Just shut up and listen to me!" she snapped again. Humphrey went silent. She'd calmed by down the time she spoke again. "She would never cheat on you Humphrey," Claws said in a calm voice that was shocking and rare for a wolf like her. "You know that. She loved you with all her heart and soul."

Claws had been about to say, "She loved you as much as I still love Scar," but she felt like that would only make him feel worse. It probably wasn't a good idea to compare his and Kate's relationship to her and Scar's relationship. Her and Scar were both Betas. Kate and Humphrey were an Alpha and Omega and complete opposites, unlike Claws and Scar were.

Humphrey didn't say anything only because he sensed Claws was going to speak again. And she did. "You know I'm not just saying this," she continued in the same shockingly calm voice. "No female would willingly cheat on her mate if she really loved him. She loved you more than she loved living life and would die if you died. She'd never do anything to hurt you unless she'd been forced to or she wasn't in her right mind…and she wasn't. You know how drunk she was. But let's forget about that fermented berry-eating contest. She wouldn't cheat on you even if she were drunk."

Humphrey sighed when Claws finally finished her short but sincere speech. "You're right," he said. "I shouldn't have thought she cheated on me…but what about that vampire that attacked you and the one Nytmen said mated with Kate? Maybe this 'Dakota,' since he's a vampire, did something to control Kate's mind into mating with him so he could bite her? He wanted a female vampire to be their queen!"

Humphrey now truly doubted that Kate cheated on him and that she ever would cheat on him. Claws was right, even if what she'd said and how she'd said it didn't sound like her at all. It was one of those moments that made someone think, "Who are you and what have you done with Claws?!" But he knew better than that. This was the real Claws, not some twin impersonator whom she'd sent to talk to him.

"I'm scared to even sleep at night now," Humphrey said a minute later. "What if they get one of us next?"

"They're not stupid enough to attack someone in the middle of a circle of wolf dens," Claws said, "even if they are wolves themselves. I was up close and personal with one of them. They have dull fur, their eyeballs are a dull yellow, and they have fire-red irises. I'd had a feeling of dread because there was something evil in the area before it'd attacked me."

"Good," he said. "Well, I think we should go see what your new friend, Nytmen, has to say about these 'vampires.' I know he's already told you what happened, and you've told me, but I want to hear it for myself from him…hopefully he knows something that can bring Kate back to life. And not as a vampire, but as herself…"


	8. A Wolf is Massacred

**Chapter 7**

**A Wolf is Massacred**

Griffin was the disowned father of Mica and his mate Banja was her disowned mother. There were both Southern Pack Alpha wolves who had lost everything each other. All eighteen of their children—Mica, Airmead, Katria, Emerilla, Siv, Rose, Nyra, Sianna, Ruby, Martin, Phillip, Dylan, Sylvana, Ginger, Thea, Coryn, Hamish, and George—had fled the Southern Territory for the same reason. Their parents were somewhat cruel wolves who'd believed that all younger wolves should have to let their parents decide who they marry. They thought the idea of free marriage was foolish, that their children would marry "rebels," "scumbags," "assholes," and "whores." They thought most wolves who weren't Southern Pack Wolves were rebels and scumbags. They considered most non-Southern Pack males to be inconsiderate assholes who only cared about themselves. And they considered most non-Southern Pack females to be whores who'd fuck anything that walked. They even considered their oldest daughter, Mica, to be a whore, a tramp, a slut…and any similar names that described how she'd married without their approval. And that was exactly how many of the Eastern and Western Pack Wolves felt about Griffin and Banja. Claws had even called Banja a "worthless and stupid whore" for how she'd produced eighteen wolf pups, and a "bitch" for how she'd treated Mica after their oldest daughter had almost died because of a caribou stampede. And for how Mica's parents had treated Stinky after he'd risked his life to same her daughter only to be treated like shit!

Griffin and Banja still remembered how that damn Western Pack Wolf called Stinky had ruined their plans to have Mica, their oldest child and the only Alpha out of all of eighteen of them. Sure, he'd saved her life, and they appreciated that, but when they'd seemed to being falling in love, they hadn't approved of them, and said she'd marry Clint, a Southern Alpha, and be happy with him. At first, she'd agreed to it, but she'd felt about for Stinky, whom she truly loved and he truly loved, and ran away from her parents' den after Airmead, a Beta and the second oldest, had teased her fur to perfection. After she married Stinky, she disowned her own parents, and they'd disowned her, too. Griffin and Banja hadn't seen Mica since, nor had she seen them since, and that was how they wanted to keep him. They didn't want to see their traitorous whore of a daughter again unless it was to kill her for what she did! They'd lost respect from everyone in their pack because they'd failed to raise their children to follow the beliefs of the Southern Wolf Pack and because all eighteen of them had ran away to become Eastern or Western Pack Wolves. And to marry wolves from those fucking improper packs of scumbag male wolves and slutty female wolves that love nothing more than a dick in their mouth!

Griffin and Banja's feelings about the wolves of the united Eastern and Western Wolf Packs were so ironic that it hurt. Griffin was one of the cruelest fathers in Jasper. No, he was probably was the cruelest wolf father in all of Canada just because of how he'd treated Mica and her seventeen siblings. And Banja was just as much a sexually active wolf as many of the females of the Eastern and Western Packs, even if she didn't admit that. What she'd just done to Griffin—deep throated him, swallowed some of his semen, and got the rest all over her face—proved that. There wasn't a single female who did all that—not even a wolf like Candy, a horny Western Pack Omega who constantly used her mate Mooch, also an Omega, to pleasure herself—in the other packs unless they were so drunk they couldn't see their faces in a reflection in the water. And Banja wouldn't even admit that she'd once let Griffin fuck her in the rear end to, in her words, "see what it felt like." And that wasn't the end of it. She'd masturbated Griffin using her paws as much as she'd used her mouth or ridden him then let his fluids spray into her mouth or all over her face. If wolves had thought Candy was nothing more than a horny fuck buddy, then they didn't really know what Banja was like!

This time, Banja had sucked Griffin off only to get his mind off of their ignorant daughter Mica and all their other children who'd ran away to marry who knows what kinds of wolves. Banja had claimed that "those Eastern and Western females loved nothing more than a dick in their mouth" but the truth was she'd probably sucked Griffin's more than any wolf she'd accused of doing it had, even Candy. She was a liar, a worthless vain wolf, and so was her mate, but neither of them was honest enough to admit to that truth. They'd never tell the truth and probably claim that their eighteen children had run away from home because they were insubordinate brats, not getting away from two abusive and cold-hearted parents.

Griffin regained his breath after the most immense climax Banja had ever caused using her mouth. She was swishing his fluids around in her mouth to savor the taste before she swallowed it. The fluids that had gotten on her face had a cooling effect, despite how warm Griffin had felt when it had sprayed out of his body onto her face. She licked it off her lips, dipped her face in the hollowed out rock that contained water, to clean the fluids off, and then looked at her mate. She'd almost made the foolish mistake of saying, "Our daughter has probably does that every night since she married that fool Stinky." That would've been foolish because her mate, as much as they loved each other, would've beaten the living shit out of her if she mentioned any of their children or Stinky in any way ever again. He'd told her that and he said he'd rip off her tail, wrap it around her neck like a rope, and choke her out with it if she mentioned any of them. The truth was that Banja was more afraid of Griffin than she was in love with him. She'd only blown him to keep him calm. He'd gone into a memory lapse of everything that'd happened involving Stinky and Mica and had been about to beat Banja. Words had done nothing to appease him, so she'd figured a blowjob would appease him. And it had, thankfully, for Banja's sake. If it hadn't she would've had her own blood all over her face rather than her mate's bodily fluids. And he would've been the one to break her nose—again!

Banja had learned not to mention Stinky or any of their children half a year after the Mica had ran away from home. She'd said "mica," referring to the minerals growing through the veins in the wall of their den, and Griffin had thought she'd mentioned the wolf. Banja had tried to explain herself, but there'd been no stopping him. He'd busted her nose, getting blood all over her voice, when about seven of their Beta and Omega children had been in their den. That had been all of them who'd still lived there half a year ago. That incident had caused two of them to run out of the den and not stop until they'd entered the Western Territory. Griffin and Banja had followed them, but they'd had no choice but to return home after realizing those two had crossed into the Western Territory, a place they were banned from for their lives. Kate and Humphrey had banned them from ever setting foot in their territory or the Eastern Territory, even if there wasn't a single wolf who still lived there.

Since King and Queen had been killed years ago, and the rogues never came to Jasper, not even to watch The Great Wolf Games like they used to (without causing trouble), Griffin and Banja were considered the greatest enemy among the Eastern and Western pack wolves. If Claws ever saw them again, she'd probably commit double homicide just at the sight of them, even if she saw them in their own territory. She had a massive grudge against those two stupid fucks that she'd only get over if she killed them. In her mind, they still had hell to pay for what they'd done to Stinky and Mica. Princess and Runt didn't feel any better about them, because of how they'd treated Stinky, who was Runt's older brother, and therefore Princess's brother-in-law because she was married to Runt. And that made Mica a sister-in-law to both of them because she was married to Stinky. They'd ordered Betas to watch the border of the Western and Northern Territory just to keep Griffin and Banja out of their territory.

"Oh, now what do they want?" Griffin snarled as Banja licked his semen off his crotch with her tongue. She had it on her lips again and her tongue was white with it.

She stopped licking him, expecting someone was going to come into their den. She wouldn't want to be caught with her head between her mate's legs by some random wolf they might not even know.

Banja kept her back turned so she could lick the fluids off her lips when a wolf came into the den. Griffin was lucky Banja had licked him clean or it would be somewhat awkward. She made sure her lips were clear by asking Griffin to look. They were, so she turned around to face this wolf. She gasped when saw what he looked like. Not only had she never seen this wolf before, his fur was a dull shade of brown, almost dray. He had yellow eyeballs and red irises. The assumed that he was sick or something, but he wasn't acting sick. He actually seemed to be healthier than any wolf they'd ever met in their lives, except for the dullness of his fur and the odd discoloration of his eyes.

"Can I help you?" Griffin asked angrily. He wasn't pleased that some random wolf would just barge into another wolf's den like that. "You'd best have a good reason for coming into someone else's den unannounced and without permission from us. And what is what is wrong with your fucked up-looking eyes? Did you get stabbed or something? And what is with your fur? I've never seen an odder wolf than you."

"I came to drink your blood," this stranger said in an eerie voice.

"Wait, what?" Griffin was baffled and horrified at the same time. But he didn't get an answer. This wolf lunged at him and sank his fangs into his neck.

Griffin screamed in agony as his throat was torn open and blood was sucked out of it through this wolf's abnormally large fangs. And Banja screamed as massive amounts of her now dead mate's blood sprayed all over her gray face.


	9. What is She Doing Here?

**Chapter 8**

**"What is she doing here?"**

Banja was running for her life, still covered in the blood of her dead mate. She couldn't get that image of Griffin being attacked by that wolf, if it could be called a wolf, out of her mind. His throat had been torn open, killing him, and that wolf had drunk her mate's blood through his two fangs on his top jaw. She didn't care if she was heading for the border of the Western Territory. If those wolves saw she was covered in blood—how would they not see that?—and she explained what happened, maybe they would let her into their territory to warn the pack leaders, Princess and Runt?

She was screaming and wailing in terror as she ran. The Beta wolves guarding the border of the Western Territory had heard her screams and they ran until they unintentionally met Banja half way.

The wolves, which included the Hutch and Candu from the Western Pack, were shocked by how bloody Banja was. They'd never seen a wolf covered in so much blood before, not even after being trampled by a caribou's hooves or gored by a caribou's antlers.

Hutch spoke for the group. "What happened?"

"Griffin!" Banja screamed.

"What happened to Griffin?" Candu asked.

"It killed him!"

"What killed him?" It was Hutch who asked that.

"A…a…v-vampire wolf!" Banja cried. "It tore open Griffin's throat and drank his blood through its fangs! I-I've n-never seen s-something like t-that before!"

"We're not the only ones dealing with them?" One of the Eastern Betas gasped. "I didn't think they'd gone as far as the Northern or Southern Territories yet!"

"We can't just stay here and talk about what might've happened," Hutch said. "Candu and I will take her to Princess and Runt's den where she can tell them what happened after she calms down."

* * *

"What is she doing here?" Princess asked, pointedly referring to Banja. But then her tone changed when she saw how bloody Banja was. Claws and Nytmen were in the den, on either side of Runt. Claws had been about to attack Banja until she'd seen all the blood on her face.

"Vampire wolf….it killed my mate!" Banja screamed. "It killed my mate…tore his throat open and drank his blood like it was water! Please tell me you have a way to stop this!"

Nytmen spoke before anyone else could. "Unless you mean find all the vampires and cut off their heads or stab them in the heart, then no. That is the only way you can stop them, except by killing the queen. If she dies, they all die. In this case, we'll have to find and kill the wolf known as 'Kate.' She was killed by one of these vampire wolves a few days ago so their leader could have a mate. She's probably pregnant with their puppies by now. Female vampire wolves are always in heat until they get pregnant. That's how they reproduce so easily."

"Tell me this is just some nightmare!" Banja wailed. "Just some fucked up nightmare I can't wake up from!"

"It's not," Claws said. "I was attacked by one of them at the river where Kate was killed and I would be dead if it wasn't for Nytmen," she added, pointing to the wolf who'd saved her life.

"How do you know so much?" Banja asked Nytmen through tears.

"Because I hunt them," Nytmen said, "and I am half vampire wolf, half living wolf. I was bitten over a year ago by the leader of these vampires but something in my blood didn't allow me to turn entirely into one of them. I have the strength of a vampire, but I also have the ability to drink blood like one, but that is a curse. Because I can, I must drink blood every few days or I slowly begin dying. Yet I can die like a normal wolf. If you tore out my guts, I would die like a normal wolf while a full-blown vampire wouldn't. And I wouldn't attack any living wolf but an evil one, so do not worry about me attacking you."

"Just tell us what happened," Runt said.

Stammering, Banja began to explain what had happened. "Well…I'd just blown Griffin and that…thing showed up right after Griffin had…you know…in my mouth and we'd just cleaned up before he'd entered our den." Banja began to cry. "I-I s-still remember it happening…Griffin had said, 'Can I help you? You'd best have a good reason for coming into someone else's den unannounced and without permission from us. And what is what is wrong with your fucked up-looking eyes? Did you get stabbed or something? And what is with your fur? I've never seen an odder wolf than you.'

"And then the vampire, or whatever it is, said to him, 'I came to drink your blood,' and then my Griffin said, 'Wait, what?' before h-his throat was torn open and that v-vampire drank his blood…that's why my f-face is so bloody…"

"That's good enough," Princess said in a consoling voice. "You should go rest up, Banja. Go to the den straight across from mine to get cleaned up and everything." She turned to the two other Betas in her den. "Hutch, Candu, why do you two lead her there? There are still a few things I need to talk about with the others."

"Yes, ma'am," Hutch said and took off with Candu, leading Banja out of the den.

"We do?" Runt asked with a confused look on his face.

"Yes, we do," Princess said. "About the vampires…it seems they aren't just killing wolves in our territory. But I don't think we need to warn the Southern Wolves. I'm pretty sure they figured out what's going already."

"So what do we do about _our_ problem?" Claws asked bitterly. She was talking to Princess, but was looking at Nytmen. "I'm not wondered about those Southern fools. Mica and her siblings are the only good Southern wolves I've ever known! If you ask me, Griffin deserved to get his throat torn open by that vampire and I wish that bitch Banja had gotten the same thing! I just hope Mica doesn't see her again."

Before anyone else could speak, Claws said this about ten seconds later: "And here is my solution to _our_ problems: we find Kate and kill her. And we must will whoever the leader of these vampires is, too. If we kill them both, all the others will be die. What's the one way you conquer a wolf pack? You kill their Alpha male and Alpha female! But if that doesn't work, we'll bring them all out in the sunlight and watch them burn up!"


	10. Pack Meeting at Sunset

**Chapter 9**

**Pack Meeting at Sunset**

The crowd of gathered wolves went about talking about their speculation amongst each other until Claws roared, "QUIET!" Everyone knew to listen to Claws when she roared the way she did.

On the ledge above them, just outside the den of the pack leaders were Princess and Runt. Behind them were Claws and Nytmen. Princess, being the dominant wolf in the pack, had called a meeting to tell everyone about what the situation was. The only wolves who did know what was going on, so far, were Claws, Nytmen, Princess, Runt, Humphrey, and Banja. These were the only wolves on the ledge outside the Alpha den.

"I could hear you all asking what is going on," Princess began speaking, "and you are all about to get your answer…from Claws." Everyone on the ledge looked at the orange-colored wolf, who seemed to be confused.

"Why me?" Claws whispered.

"You have seen these vampires face-to-face," Runt said.

"So has Banja!"

"Does she look like she wants to talk about it?" Humphrey said. "She saw her mate get his throat slashed open. Would you want to talk if you saw that happen to Scar? I mean, did any of us even know vampires were real before the day you were attacked by that one at the river?"

"No," Claws said with a snarl in her voice. "But fine…I'll speak, but I'm going to be brief about it."

"Do you want to know what's going on?" Claws asked rhetorically in a loud voice. "Well, Jasper Park is being plagued by the undead and I don't mean the zombies from one of Kate's dreams. We just thought it was just an isolated event when Kate was killed, but it doesn't seem like it is. Banja is here because her mate, Griffin, was killed by these 'vampire' wolves not too long ago."

Claws motioned for Nytmen to come up next to her. "This is Nytmen, from Red Deer Park," she continued. "I would be dead if it weren't for what he did after I found Kate's body in the river. I was attacked by one of these 'vampires' and he killed it when my eyes were closed. In a note he left behind, he told me to meet him in one of the forests in Jasper at sunset before the vampires came out. That is because he is part vampire after being bitten by their 'alpha male' before leaving Red Deer Park to spend his life hunting them. And before any of you ask why he isn't a vampire…well, he is, but only partially. Something in his blood prevented him from becoming a full-blown vampire. While he does not have the violent tendencies they have, he does have their strength, but his strength comes with two curses. First, he must drink blood of the living every few days, and I am willing to do that since us living wolves replenish our blood faster than he can drink it from this now covered-up gash in my paw."

She waved it at the crowd to show them she had it wrapped up in a sticky leaf. "He told me in the forest that Kate's body had disappeared from the river because she turned into a vampire after Dakota had tricked it—do not forget that she was drunk on the night she died—into mating with her because she had no mating, it seems, only to bite and infect her so she could became the mate of the 'alpha vampire.'" Everyone in the group, as well as the wolves behind her, excluding Nytmen, gasped with horror more than anything. "The only good thing that came out of my meeting with Nytmen is that we can kill them all if we kill the queen, if we kill Kate—again. If any living male wolf kills her, all of the vampires will just die, including the 'Alpha male,' but if a living female wolf is strong, brave enough, in Nytmen's words, to kill the queen, she'll have the power to take full control of the vampires. And she can have them walk away to their deaths. It's her choice what happens to the vampires, not their 'Alpha male.' Lead them or kill them, it is her choice. The same goes for the 'Alpha male' if he is killed by a strong and brave living male wolf."

Nytmen took over. He was going to tell the Eastern and Western Pack Wolves everything Claws had failed to cover. "There is only four ways you can kill these vampire wolves," he said. "The first way is the simplest and probably safest way to kill one: being impaled through the heart by almost anything. The second way is to expose the vampires to sunlight, which will burn their flesh to nothing, and kill them, after prolonged exposure. That is the most difficult way to kill them because they're not stupid. You won't get them out during the day for any reason, not even if you offered them all the blood they'd ever want. The third way is not possible among us wolves, but I'll tell it to you so you all know it: holy water can be as potent to the vampires as sunlight is. The forth way is complete decapitation. If you cut off their heads, they cannot go on living and their bodies will shut down immediately. Lastly, killing the queen or the Alpha male will give the killer of either one of them the ability to control them if he or she is a strong and brave wolf, as Claws said."

"You're forgetting one thing, Nytmen," Claws said. "If a vampire drinks blood of another vampire, somehow, they'll get sick. I mean _very_ sick. They'll vomit, their skin will burn off, and they'll bleed from their eyes. And finally, they explode or disintegrate. And do not, I repeat, _do not_, get bitten or scratched by any of the vampires. Or you'll become one, unless you're fortunate—" She used that term hesitantly. "—to have something in your blood that prevents you from becoming a vampire, like Nytmen does, but then you'll be up for living a possibly hellish life until you die. Being a full-blown vampire is a better fate than being a partial one, according to Nytmen."

Claws was done and Princess called an end to the meeting. She told everyone to return to their homes and be careful just before Humphrey addressed Claws, in tears.

"Are you saying we'll have to kill Kate again?" Humphrey asked sadly.

"Yes," Claws and Nytmen said together.

"If we don't stop her," Claws said, "there could be many more deaths than just Kate and Griffin. We must kill her to stop them all. Even if we kill the Alpha male of the vampires, Kate will still die because Nytmen would make the decision to lead all the vampires, as their new leader, into the sunlight. And I would do the same if it is I who kills Kate and becomes their leader…I'm sorry, Humphrey, but Kate must die again to stop them all."


	11. Victim of a Different Killer

**Chapter 10**

**Victim of a Different Killer**

Garth was sick. Very sick. As sick as Lilly was pregnant. In the den where Eve, Candy, and other wolves took care of the sick wolves. Garth and many others were in there. Some were dying. Nytmen had told them that these wolves were sick because of the virus that came with the vampires. But for Garth and these other sick and dying wolves to have been infected, the vampires must've been near where these wolves slept. Lilly knew that meant the vampires must've been near where she lived in the tall grass with Garth.

Eve, one of the former Alpha females, and the mother of Kate and Lilly, had said there was nothing more that could be done for Garth. Lilly was absolutely tragic and it was easy to understand why. She was on the verge of giving birth and now the father of her pups was going to die before they were born! Even if she did give birth in this moment, Garth wouldn't see their children because he was in a coma. And he could die at any time, Eve had cautiously told her youngest daughter. Lilly had told her mother and the other "nurse" wolves to leave her alone with her dying mating. She wouldn't have if she knew there was anything that could be done for the others or Garth, but Lilly, her mother, Candy, and the others all knew too well that none of these dying wolves would survive. Luckily, for the healthy wolves, at least, they didn't need to worry about being infected. It couldn't spread from living wolf to living wolf. Only from vampire wolves to living wolves.

The snow-white wolf was in tears. She hadn't shed so many tears before and never so loudly since Kate almost died because of the stampede of caribou many years ago. Not until Kate was killed by one of these vampires, and not until this moment as Garth lay here on his deathbed. Knowing that she wouldn't be infected by her mate's condition, Lilly crying into his chest, which was still rising up and down. With her eyes closed, she could only feel that the time between his chest rising and falling was increasing. She knew that, sooner or later, it would stop rising and falling, and that Garth's breathing would stop with it. She'd never thought her mate would die so young.

Neither Lilly or Garth, or any of the other dying wolves or their relatives, knew when the now dying wolves had been infected by the vampires' disease or how. There weren't any bites on their necks or any part of their body. Not a single scratch, either. She remembered the day she'd found Garth coughing and wheezing when she woke up. He'd been drinking a lot of water from the pond near the clearing in the field they lived in. He didn't even know how he'd gotten sick. Garth had woke up with a sore throat, bloodshot eyes, a scratchy voice, aching limbs, back, and neck, and a dull look in the color of his fur, eyes, and the inside of his mouth. Lilly hadn't been able to convince him to get see Eve for some help until he'd vomited up blood all over Lilly—thankfully, it didn't get her sick like Garth was, even though she'd thrown up before taking him to get help. But, despite all of her and Candy's efforts, Eve hadn't been able to help Garth, and now he was going to be dead in a matter of minutes to hours. He'd been here all morning and it was remarkable that he hadn't died yet. Although Lilly would hate to see him go, she wished Garth would just pass away already so he wouldn't be suffering anymore.

Although Garth was in a coma, Lilly would hear him breathing and gasping for breath. It was not an entire coma. He couldn't use any of us muscles, including his eyelids, but he could still breathe, but for how long? That was the question. Garth had been like this since an hour after he'd been found by Lilly. On a bed of moss, Garth was lying on his back entirely motionless. He hadn't moved a muscle since he'd been laid down on this moss bed by Eve and Candy.

Lilly had given up almost all of her hope of seeing him live through this and she'd stopped looking at the only wolf she'd ever truly loved. She was looking at her large belly, thinking about the unborn puppies that would probably never see their father. She can't imagine what it would be like to be a widow raising puppies. She knew Claws was going through it because Scar had been killed by the rogues two years ago during the final battle with King's pack. Maybe she could seek Claws out for some advice about how to handle it? Claws had raised all six of her children without any help from other wolves. She hadn't and still didn't want help from anyone unless it was Scar and he's dead. Lilly's tears were dripping from her eyes and falling down onto her large belly. She didn't care, as she stared at her belly, thinking about what her puppies might look like. Would her daughters look like her or would they look like Garth? And what about their sons? Would they look more like her or like him?

"Oh, Garth," Lilly cried. "Why did this have to happen to you?" She was talking to herself because there was no one else to talk to but herself. She'd probably go insane if she talked to the other wolves who were in a coma because they wouldn't answer. At least she could talk to herself, not that her reason for that would make much sense. "What about our puppies?" Lilly tried to wipe her tears away, but they came right back. Before she could ask herself "How will I possibly raise them without you?" Garth began convulsing and groaning. He was coughing up blood, which he choked on because he was on his back.

Lilly screamed for her mother, Candy, and the vegetarians Reba and Janice. But by the time they arrived, Garth was gone. He'd died before they could even reach the mouth of the healers' den, let alone say anything.

Janice was the first to speak after five minutes of complete silence except for the other wolves dying without any way to help them stay alive. "I'm so sorry, Lilly," she said in a sad voice. "I wish there'd been something we could've done for him."

"Nothing can be done for them now," Lilly said in a dark voice, "but kill all of the vampires." Her tone changed from a dark one to a sad one. "Now, if you excuse me, I want to go be alone with Humphrey…he's the only one who can imagine what I'm going through." Lilly was crying loudly, almost screaming, as she ran out of the healers' den.

"I can't imagine what she's going through," Candy said in a sympathetic tone. She couldn't imagine how she'd react if it was her in Lilly's position and Mooch being the one who just died instead of Garth. "I just wish we could've done something to save Garth's life…now poor Lilly will have to raise their puppies without a father. No wolf mother deserves such a fate," she added, trying not to cry, although Candy found it to be impossible. Eve, Reba, and Janice weren't any better off. All four of these females were in tears and not just for Lilly and Garth, but for the other sick wolves who'd died at the same moment Garth had.

"He's a victim of a different killer," Eve said darkly, "yet his death came from the same killer of Kate and Griffin…" Then she added, "I don't think there truly is anything that can be done…"


	12. Paranoia

**Chapter 11**

**Paranoia**

"Vampires?!" the widowed female screamed. "How could this be happening?! They killed me mate and now the river in Jasper is contaminated with their blood?!" It was Banja who was screaming because, first, she'd witnessed her mate, Griffin, get killed by a vampire. And now wolves were dying because the river was contaminated with Kate's infected blood.

A warning had been sent to the Northern and Southern Wolf Packs that the large river flowing through their territories was contaminated and shouldn't be drank from. It was the former rogue Alpha, Melissa, and her Beta mate Hutch who'd been sent to warn the Southern Wolf Pack, while Claws and Candu, another Beta, had been sent to the Northern Territory to warn the wolves there. Unlike in the Central Territory, the Northern and Southern Wolves were lucky to have received the warning before anyone got sick. And there were other rivers in each of the territories that were not contaminated…yet. While it would prevent more deaths from contaminated water, it wouldn't bring back Garth or the other wolves who died because of the contaminated water. Just like Banja, Lilly was absolutely tragic over the death of her mate. More so, because she was pregnant with Garth's puppies. She'd be giving birth in a few days.

"I don't have an answer to that," Melissa said. She and Hutch had allowed Banja to live in their den, where she'd be safe from the vampires at night. Their den was well hidden on the hill where all the Eastern and Western Wolves lived in dens below the den of the Princess and Runt, the pack leaders. "But I wish I did. We know what's going on, but we don't know why. I don't think even Nytmen knows what's going on."

Melissa was formerly an Alpha wolf from King's pack sent to spy on the Jasper wolves with a male Alpha called Geoff. But he was killed by Kate for not siding with their pack as Melissa had done. She'd hated King from the day she could first see him and had wanted to get away from that day. So she'd taken advantage of being ordered to spy on the Jasper Wolves so she could join them. She was instrumental in the deaths of King and his mate Queen, which had earned her trust amongst all of the Jasper wolves.

Banja, more or less, a member of the Central Wolf Pack now, was also here because she'd wanted to see her daughter, Mica, and her other siblings again. Mica was here and had said she'd tell them what their mother had to say when she sees them later. Mica had no idea, yet, that her father was dead, killed by one of the vampire wolves. That was why Banja had wanted to see her children.

In a shaky voice, that told Mica something was wrong, Banja said, "Mica, I have some bad news."

"What?" Mica asked in a hesitant tone.

"Your father…" Banja cried. "…was killed by one of these 'vampire wolves' shortly before I arrived here…I'm so sorry…"

As much as Mica had hated her father, she felt sad hearing that he'd been killed. After all, she wouldn't have become an Alpha, or even exist, if it wasn't for Griffin. He was the one who'd gotten Banja pregnant with her and Mica's seventeen siblings. She'd wished he would just die, but that that it had happened because of these fucking vampires, Mica regretted ever wishing death to her father. She was hoping her mother wouldn't share the same fate. And she shouldn't as long as she stayed in Melissa and Hutch's den.

Mica started crying. She hated her father, but his death was hard hitting. She'd imagined being like this if Stinky died, but not if her father died. She assumed it was because, no matter what, Griffin was still her father even if they'd disowned each other, and that he was murdered by the vampires that took her uncle-in-law Garth away from her by contaminating the river. Mica didn't react when she felt her mother hug her. This was the first time they'd had contact with each other in years, let alone hugged each other. They both wished that it were under better, and happier, circumstances, such as them getting over their differences, and being together. Not because of the murder of one of their family members.

"I'm sorry about your father, Mica, and your mate, Banja," Melissa said after a minute of silence. "No one deserves to die like that. I just hope that he died a quick death so he didn't suffer for long. No one deserves to be killed by vampire wolves and no one deserves to suffer."

Melissa wanted to say that the rogues from Banff deserved to be killed by the vampires, and to suffer, but that wouldn't make Mica and Banja feel better than they did. She doubted anything would make them feel better about the situation. After all, Mica had lost her father, as much of an asshole he might've been, and Banja was a widow now.

_How many wolves will lose their mates before this is over?_ Melissa wondered. _First Humphrey, then Banja, and now Lilly? Who's next? And what if these vampires cause wolves to become orphans? What if they kill Humphrey, Banja, or Lilly? Runt, Claudette, and Stinky would take Humphrey's death worse than the others would take their parents' deaths. I doubt Mica's siblings will miss their mother if she dies. And I just pray that if Lilly does die she at least gives birth first! Nothing is worse than dying with puppies inside you! But they would not last without their mother's milk…and I don't know if any females would be willing to adopt them…they'd have their own puppies to nurse!_

_And what if I lose Hutch?_ Melissa thought. She wasn't a mother yet, but she mated with him recently and was probably pregnant, considering how it was mating season and she'd been in heat then. _What will I do with him? And how would I raise our puppies without Hutch if he dies? Oh, I just wish this were over. I thought living in Banff was a nightmare, but this is worse. It's Hell!_ Before this situation with the vampires had begun, Melissa had thought there wasn't any type of hell, other than Hell itself, that was worse than living in Banff, whether a slave or a member of the pack.

Melissa had only gone through hell twice in Banff. The first time was when her parents were killed by fellow rogues in the blood spots, leaving her an orphan whom no one had wanted to adopt. The second one was more directly related to her than losing her parents, even. She'd lived alone from the day she was orphaned to the day she joined the Jasper wolves and so it was easy for wolves to take advantage of her. When she'd been sleeping, two male wolves had attacked her, and brutally gang-raped her. One had mated with her, not getting her pregnant, thankfully, while another had done the same thing to her mouth. Then they'd switched places and did it again, each wolf had done what the other had just finished doing. The last straw had been when they'd tried to double penetrate Melissa—mate with her at the same time—and she'd lost her head over it, figuratively speaking. She'd gone insane, castrating them before tearing out their throats and hiding their bodies in a place where they'd never be found again. And they hadn't been found to this day, nor did anyone know that Melissa had killed them or been raped by them.

_Enough about the fucking past,_ Melissa thought bitterly. _We have to worry about the present, and these fucking vampires or whatever the fuck Nytmen calls them. I can't go on worry about the wolves who'd raped me repeatedly—I showed why they shouldn't have come into my den, that's for sure!_

* * *

Banja went insane the next day and disappeared without a trace after attacking Melissa when Hutch was away. Of course, everyone in the Eastern and Western Pack knew to blame what had happened on the brutal death of her mate. They were sure that anyone would act out like that if they saw their mate get his or her throat torn open by a vampire wolf.

None of the search parties that had been sent out by Princess and Runt, led by them, Claws, and other Alpha and Beta wolves, could find Banja because they were looking in all the wrong places. She'd gone to the place where Kate had been killed, at the edge of the contaminated river, to be alone and to mourn Griffin's death. She'd truly loved Griffin, even if he was one of the cruelest wolves alive since King. But they were both dead, so the cruelest wolves alive—or undead, in this case—were the vampires who'd killed him.

Banja was extremely tempted to drink that water just so she wouldn't have to live anymore. What reason was there for her to live? She was living with two wolves she didn't even know and the only wolves who she did know in this entire territory were her children, but she doubted that any of them would want her! Mica would, but Stinky wouldn't allow it because of how Banja and Griffin had treated his mate, who was their disowned daughter. Her life had gone to shit just because her mate was killed by these vampires.

_No,_ Banja thought, _my life went to shit when I let Griffin convince me to arrange a marriage for Mica! He should've just let her marry whomever she wanted and not been such a dick about it! He ruined my life and convinced me to ruin all of our children's lives, too! I hope he's happy with burning in Hell because he deserves it…_

"…and I'm glad that vampire tore his fuckin' throat open!" Banja shouted aloud. Then she went into a profane condemning of the vampires. "Where the fuck are you?!" she roared. "Show your ugly faces! It's getting dark out—are you too fucking pussy to DRINK MY BLOOD! You already murdered my scumbag of a mate, so what makes his blood more fucking attractive than my blood IS?! HUH?! Are you afraid of me! I've always said dead things are pussies!"

"At least I don't have a loose one, you whore," Banja heard a scratch female voice said.

"I wouldn't have married her if I was the wolf I killed," she heard a male voice say.

Banja turned around and saw five vampire wolves standing there. Two males and three females. She recognized each of them. First, there was Dakota, the one who killed her mate. Then there was a female next to him—it was her older sister. She wasn't sure who the other two females were, but the second male wolf was Garth. She knew who he was because he'd been the teacher of Alpha school since Winston retired from the role as the teacher and as the Western Pack Leader. Garth had been there when Mica had been taken to Alpha school by her father.

"I smell good, fresh blood in her!" Garth, now a vampire, said. No one was aware, yet, that his body had disappeared from the den the deceased were stored in before their funerals. The others were possibly the wolves who'd died with him before Lilly's eyes. He didn't have any concern for Lilly or their pups now. All he wanted was some blood! He'd drink Lilly's if it came to that. She was nothing to Garth now that he was a vampire!

"Get her!" Dakota shouted.

Banja screamed as she tried to run away, but was pinned done by four of the vampires. There was one vampire wolf at each of her four limbs. And there was no escape, either. Banja now realized who the second female was. It was Kate.

"Now," Kate was saying, "you have two options. The first one is this: if you want, I will just bite you, and we'll wait for you to transform, then you can call me your queen! Or, we can all drink your blood until you're dry and nothing more than a shriveled up corpse!"

"You can drink my blood and I hope you all fucking choke to death on it!" Banja screamed. "Just get it over with!"

"Be that way," Kate said sourly. "You hear it. Show her no mercy."

The five vampire wolves attacked Banja like a swarm and they sank their fangs into her in five different spots. Banja screamed in agony the entire time as she felt blood leaving her body so quickly that it caused her flesh and fur to contract. She felt it squeezing against her bones until it got so tight that her eyeballs popped out of her head after she died. The vampires didn't stop until there wasn't an ounce of blood left in Banja's body. They'd lived up to what Kate said. Her body was just a shriveled up corpse now. No blood left in her body to drink.

And she wouldn't become a vampire because Kate had just crushed Banja's skull underneath one of her hind legs. It crushed like an egg, only spilling her gray, bloodless brains into the river before they kicked her body into it, too.


	13. A Southern Alpha Mourns

**Chapter 12**

**A Southern Alpha Mourns**

"Where on Earth is my mother?" Mica asked. Mica was the former Southern Pack Alpha, who'd been disowned by her parents Banja and Griffin for leaving the Southern Wolf Pack to marry Stinky. She knew her father was dead, but was not yet aware of the fact that the scouting team led by Claws and Nytmen had found her mother's shriveled and bloodless corpse in the same river where Kate was killed by Dakota days earlier.

Claws was hesitant in answering this question. Stinky, Mica's mate, and Scarlet, an Alpha and Claws's niece, were on either side of her. Scarlet was the daughter of Claws's younger sister. Claws got over her hesitancy and said, "I'm sorry Mica…but your mother…"

"No!" Mica wailed. "Don't say it!"

"…I'm so sorry, Mica, but she was found dead in the same river Kate was killed by," Claws continued in a sad, reluctant voice. "She was drained of blood…and her skull crushed…"

"Stop it! Stop it, Claws!" Mica wailed again. "Just stop it! I don't want to hear anymore! You told me she's dead, now just shut up, and stop describing what she looked like! It's bad enough know that she was killed by those vampires—you don't have to describe what she looked like!" Then Mica said something she never had before in her life. "Oh, fuck…why why?! Why did they have to kill my mother…why…why did they kill her?! Damn them! Damn them all, even Kate and Garth!"

Stinky turned to Claws, as Scarlet—who was Mica's oldest friend, whom she'd known since her days in Alpha school—consoled Mica.

"Claws, I want you to leave our den," he said. "Scarlet and I want to be alone with Mica."

"Yes," Claws said softly and left the den. As she walked back to her own, she heard some male and female wolves from her pack whispering amongst each other. She knew they were gossiping about something.

"Griffin might've been a dick," one of them was saying, "but he didn't deserve that. He and Banja really had guts to stick up to those vampires before they were killed."

That pissed Claws off. She said to them, "Just because someone is a dick doesn't mean they have one." She was referring to Griffin because these wolves obviously didn't know what really happened. Griffin hadn't stood up to that vampire. He'd insulted him. Banja was the only one who'd had the guts to stand up to them.

Claws went into a rant about Griffin as Stinky and Scarlet consoled Mica over the loss of her mother, whom she'd been talking to only hours earlier. She'd been consoled by Banja over the death of her father and now she was being consoled by her mate and oldest friend over the death of her mother. Who would console her if Stinky and Scarlet died? She'd have no one left but puppies she'd given birth over two years ago, plus Stinky and Scarlet.

Mica was not only crying, shedding large tears, but she was also wailing miserably. She hated her father, yes, but she'd never wish he or her mother were dead. She didn't hate Griffin that much and she'd still cared for her mother. Banja was a good wolf who wouldn't do any wrong unless she was forced her and she'd been forced to by Griffin for the entire time they'd been together. Mica knew that and so she knew her mother wasn't the bad wolf many members of her pack thought she was. Mica was flat on her belly, wailing her parents' names, mostly her mother's, because of how much hate there was for her father in her usually loving heart. She was crying her eyes out much worse she had and ever would for her father.

"Oh, mother!" Mica wailed. "Why did you have to run away from the safety of Melissa and Hutch's den?! You were safe there and would still be alive if you hadn't run away!" It was like Mica was talking to her mother's spirit even though Banja's spirit wasn't here in this den, but, Mica hoped, in heaven. "Oh, mother…I miss you…and love you…I wish you weren't gone…"

Stinky couldn't bear to see his mate like this anymore. There wasn't a wolf who was more happy-go-lucky than Mica. There never had been and there wouldn't be another like her. She always tried to look on the bright side of things, just like Lilly and Magril, but she couldn't in this moment. Neither could Lilly, who'd also lost a loved one to these vampires. Mica had lost her loving mother Banja and Lilly had lost Garth, the only wolf she'd ever been truly in love with. It almost killed Stinky on the inside to see his mate, who was his only true love, in such psychological agony.

"Please don't cry, Mica," Stinky said. "It'll be ok, I promise. I'm here. I'll always be here." He nuzzled Mica's cheek with his snout, running his wet nose through the fur on her cheek and through her hackles, which were sticking up because of how sad she was. Normally, the lines of hairs on the back of a wolf's neck, called hackles, only stood up with a wolf was angry or threatened, but it was rare for hackles to rise when a wolf was sad. It usually meant that wolf wanted to be left alone, but Mica could never turn Stinky away. "I love you and so did your mom," he went on. "She just made some mistakes, like we all do."

Stinky added that, not knowing that Mica loved her mother despite all the mistakes she'd made. But Mica wouldn't say anything since her loving mate was only trying to help her. She'd never gotten mad at Stinky in her life and she never would. He'd never do or say anything to hurt her. And she'd never forget that if it weren't for Stinky she wouldn't be here now to mourn her mother. She would've been trampled to death by those caribou if it hadn't Stinky actions. Claws's too, but she hadn't stuck around for long because Stinky had told her just to run, so if something bad had happened to him and Mica, she wouldn't die with them. Still, Mica was respectful of Claws for volunteering to save her when no one from her own pack had. Not even the leader of her hunting group had. He'd called Claws and Stinky crazy for trying to save her and they hate him for that. She'd been in love with Stinky form the moment they'd first laid eyes upon each other and their live had become permanent when she'd been on top of Stinky after the stampede of caribou had ended, and they'd come out from underneath that log that had kept them safe from the caribous' hooves.

"Don't forget, also, Mica," Stinky said, "you still have my family. They all love you very much. My...mom loved you very much as well. She'd acted as if you were a daughter she'd given birth to. She loved you so much when she was alive."

"Thank you, Stinky, but what if something bad happens to you and Scarlet?" Mica asked in a sad voice, as she buried her face in the fur on Stinky's chest. "And what am I going to do without my mother? We'd just started getting close to each other…and now she's gone!" She began shedding tears again, which Stinky felt dripping through the fur on his chest. "I love you Stinky," she whimpered. "You're the best mate I could ask for. Thank you for everything you've done for me in the past few years."

Scarlet felt like she should say something, since she was Mica's first, oldest, and best friend. It would be wrong for her not to say something to console her oldest best friend. And because Scarlet's parents were still alive, she felt even worse about Mica's situation. She might be an adult, but Mica was now an orphan!

"I'm sorry, Mica, I really am," Scarlet said in a slow voice. "I know they say this all the time, but your mother's in a better place now. And I'm here. I'll always be here." Then she decided to say something related to Mica's mother that would comfort her, she was sure. "It'll all be ok, I promise. Trust me…your mom wouldn't want to see you cry like this. I know that."

Mica turned away from Stinky to look into Scarlet's green eyes. She realized how much truth there was in Scarlet's statement just by looking deep into her eyes.

Scarlet continued, "My aunt, Claws, once said, 'No matter how much it hurts to let it go, you cannot live in the past for ever or you'll slowly going insane. You can mourn your lost loved ones, but you cannot allow your sadness to ruin your life.' I'd been living with my aunt after my brother died the a year after we'd gotten out of Alpha school, during that harsh winter, and I'd been too depressed to return to my parents' den because he'd died there. There were too many good memories of my brother there for me to ever want to live in that den again."

"Thank you for saying that, Scarlet," Mica said in a slightly happier voice. "I'm glad you said that." Although she was still crying because of her mother, she wasn't screaming and cursing about Banja's death.

* * *

Two days later, Mica lost it over the sudden realization of what her mother's death really meant to her. She tried to end her own life with a sharp rock, but Stinky and Scarlet had been there to stop her before she did too much damage to her throat. She recovered with Eve, Candy, and the vegetarians, Reba and Janice, then returned to her den with a completely different mindset: she wanted to kill the vampires who murdered her parents and send them all straight to Hell where they belong.


	14. The Vampires' Alpha Male

**Chapter 13**

**The Vampires' Alpha Male**

Kate was in the den of the vampire Alpha male, not to speak with him but to mate with him. She was the Alpha female of the vampires because he'd chosen her and had used Dakota, her ex-boyfriend in life, to turn her into a vampire. She'd told Dakota that she was single when before he'd bitten her, and he'd passed that information on to the vampire Alpha male. He wanted a virgin female vampire to be his mate and Kate was that one. None of the other female wolves who'd been turned into vampires was virgins.

The vampire Alpha male was King, the former rogue leader of the Alpha males who'd died in an attack he'd led on Jasper two years ago. His corpse had been found by the vampires who'd infected Dakota and they'd brought him back to life by using a spell to regenerate his body, and bring him back to life as a normal wolf. Then one of them had bitten him before he'd been able to get away, turning him into a vampire. And they'd chosen him as their leader since he already had the experience to be a leader, having once been the Alpha male of Banff. They'd done the same thing to Queen, his mate who also died in the same battle with Jasper, only to make her one of his followers. She was still loyal to him, even though Queen was not his mate as a vampire. She was supportive of Kate being such since she was a virgin, unlike Queen. King wanted a virgin female vampire so they would create pure offspring. If her body was tainted by the fluids of a living male, and if she'd already given birth, her past actions could cause hybrid offspring to be created. And King didn't want any half wolf, half vampire offspring. He wanted their offspring to be full-blown vampires just like him and Kate.

Kate turned around and stuck her butt up in the air for King. "Come on, King, let's see what you can do with that big dick of yours," she said. "Make me beg for your cock. Then fuck my wet pussy with no mercy!"

"You want this?" King said, noticing how Kate was eyeing his dick with nothing but lust. "I want you to beg for it and say you're my dirty little Alpha whore. Say it!"

"I'm your dirty little Alpha whore!" Kate yelled at him, shaking her hips back and forth to entice him further. She knew he could see her pussy, which was dripping wet because she'd just gotten done masturbating for King, at his request, so she really wanted him to get hard for when he fucked her. She hoped that she'd fuck her as hard as his dick was!

"Say it again!" King commanded. "And then I want you to beg for my dick like your life depends on it!"

"I'm your dirty little Alpha whore!" she yelled again. "And I want your dick! I want it crammed so deep into my pussy that you'll have to have me cut open to get it out!"

"I hope you can handle this!" King said and then mounted Kate. She felt him stick himself into her and begin thrusting. She'd never felt this good before, not even the time she rode Humphrey even if she hadn't been in heat then. But she was in heat now, as all female vampire wolves were constantly, until they mated, so she would get pregnant when King was done with her!

"Ahh... King you're absolutely massive!" Kate screamed with pleasure. "Harder King!" He started thrusting harder in and out of Kate when she said that. "Oh, fuck yes!" she cried. "Faster! Harder! Deeper! I want you to go balls deep in my pussy every time you thrust!"

"As you wish, my dirty little Alpha whore," King said, and began doing that. She was going to be leaking out more than just his semen by the time he was done with her! Kate wanted him to be rough with her, so he was going to make her bleed before he reached his climax! He was sure she'd enjoy bleeding during such rough sex!

Kate screamed every time he went "balls deep," to quote her, into her pussy. Comparing it to when she'd deep throated Dakota before he'd turned her into a vampire, only with her pussy, the entire length of King's dick was being forced into her pussy, just as she'd forced the entire length of Dakota's dick into her mouth many days earlier. She was hoping she'd get the chance to do the same thing to King. She knew that the higher a wolf ranked in a pack, the bigger his dick was and the better his semen tasted. Dakota's semen had tasted so much better than Humphrey's, she thought dirtily as King destroyed her pussy with his thrusting. Kate could tell that she was already bleeding, not that it affected a vampire any. It's not that easy to kill what's already dead, especially vampires. There were very few ways to kill a vampire and many of them were difficult for wolves to accomplish.

No one had ever made Kate scream like this when she'd mated. Not Garth, not Humphrey, and not Dakota. King was being rougher with her than any other male ever had in life and she was enjoying it. Kate loved being fucked roughly and treated like a male's whore. The second hadn't been the case when she'd been alive, but it was now that she was a vampire. She'd let King fuck her in the ass later if he wanted to and then ejaculate all over her face! She loved getting semen all over her face, even when she was alive, after giving a blowjob, because it made her face feel all warm, and sticky. She loved it when a male made her feel warm, whether they mated, he gave her anal, or he gave her a facial. Kate loved swallowing semen more than getting it anyone where in or on her body. She loved the thickness and the salty taste of it. And it felt so good when it sprayed into her mouth and even better, when she swallowed it because of because of how those fluids felt. Kate thought that semen was about as thick as maple syrup, which made her like it even more, but it wasn't as sweet.

"Ahh... King you're absolutely massive!" Kate cried. "I love your massive dick! I'd take it in my pussy everyday if I could!"

"Do you like my dick, Kate?" King asked in a taunting voice as he thrusted his dick, harshly, in and out of Kate's bleeding pussy. She orgasmed again, and spraying a pink—because of the blood—fluid out of her pussy.

"Yes!" Kate screamed. "I love your dick! I'd deep throat it every day of my life just because I love the taste of male's dick and cum! I'm sure yours will taste better than any other I've ever male whom I've sucked off!"

"I know you do, Kate!" King said, then went on with his harsh thrust. Because of how wet Kate's pussy was, with her own fluids, there were constantly squishing sounds as their hips smacked together. It was so loud that it echoed in their den located in the abandoned territory of the Eastern Pack Wolves. They were in Tony's den because of how large of a den it was.

King was constantly ramming the entire length of his dick into Kate, ramming her with his knot, the part of a male wolf's reproductive organ that he forced into a female during ejaculation. It prevented the female from escaping before his ejaculation was over, so it guaranteed her pregnancy. If a female tried to escape a male who'd knotted her, it would not only be extremely painful for the male—it could tear his knot off—but also for the female because she'd have to go through the pain of her own flesh tearing, and having a knot stuck inside her for the rest of her life. That is, unless the healer in her pack somehow managed to remove it from her.

Not only was his thrusting in and out of Kate making wet sounds, but also the collision of King's hips with Kate's hips, as his knot rammed her butt. They were both drooling, something that all dogs, wild or not, did when they were in pleasure, or when they were hot. Obviously, Kate and King were in pleasure, but they were also hot and sweaty because of all the physical exertion they were doing. It took a lot of energy to mate, especially for the male to reach his climax, and for the female to take all this. Normally, wolves never mated this roughly, but Kate and King were far from normal wolves, so she expected him to be rough with her because the roughness of this meant more pleasure for Kate. That was what Kate believed and what King went with.

"Harder King! Go as fast and as deep as you can!" Kate commanded. This provoked King to thrust into her and to pound his hips into her's harder than ever. "Fuck yes!" she screamed. "You hit the spot, literally!"

Then Kate went into a short rant about King's forceful actions. "Pound my pussy!" she ordered King. "Make me unable to walk!" She felt him cram his knot into her pussy, and then carefully take it out so he didn't hurt himself or Kate. "Oh, yes…" Kate moaned. "Keep ramming that wet knot into my pussy!"

"Your pussy is so wet!" Kate shouted in please. "I swear, I think I can hear the squishing sounds it's making when I thrust. You're so hot..."

King knotted Kate again, even though he wasn't climaxing, and she cried, "Oh yes! Make my pussy sore! I can't wait for you to coat my pussy with cum!" Kate added, "And I can't wait to have your cum shoot deep into my pussy!"

"You're way tighter than Queen ever was," he said. "My dick is already soaking wet." Queen was the she-Alpha wolf of Banff who'd been in his mate in life, but was his advisor now that they were both vampire wolves. Being brought back to life by those vampires had taken their love away from each other, even if they were still just as loyal to each other. King just needed to mate with a virgin wolf and he'd found that.

Of course, King had completely forgotten how Kate had been married to Humphrey in life, and had three puppies with him—Runt, Claudette, and Stinky. Not to mention she'd once mated with Garth, even if she hadn't been in heat then, and rode him to get anal from him. Kate was less of a virgin than even Queen was. She'd only mated once in her life and hated wolves who acted like whores. She'd once called Princess, her and King's only surviving offspring, a whore for mating with Runt when Princess and Runt had been enslaved in Banff. Queen would be pissed off to see how much King was pleasuring Kate because he'd never made her feel that good when they were alive. And if she'd heard King say that Kate was tighter than she was, she'd commit bloody murder over that. Queen wouldn't care if Kate were supposed to be the next Queen! They'd have to find another virgin she-wolf for King to fuck!

"Mmm! I love it when your balls snaking against my stomach..." Kate moaned as she felt King's scrotum bouncing against her underside as he forced the entire length of his dick into her pussy. He wasn't showing her any mercy, just as she'd begged him to do when Kate had said she'd let him fuck her, or she'd suck his dick, on a daily basis. "Oh yes! Pound my pussy! Ohh please, harder, faster, deeper!"

"I can't do much deeper!" King said in a voice that wasn't serious at all. "Not unless you want me to cram my balls in there, too!"

"I'd enjoy that!" Kate screeched. "I'm just your dirty little Alpha whore and your fuck buddy!" she added in a dirty voice that basically said, "I'm going to suck you off when we're all done!" King knew that was probably what Kate was thinking and he was writing. Kate wanted to put the entire thing in her mouth and then some. She'd try to fit all the way to his scrotum in her mouth. She was going to give a new meaning to the phrase deep throating when she was done with King's dick!

"Admit I'm the better Alpha, my queen..." King moaned. "I want you to say that I'm the better Alpha! And don't forget to say that you're my dirty, little Alpha whore again!"

"You're the better Alpha!" Kate agreed. "You always were, even back in Banff! You were the better Alpha and the better leader! We had to outsmart you rather than outfight you to defeat you! I'd be a real leader if my wolves had out fought you!" She almost forgot about the second part of his request. "And I'm your dirty, little Alpha whore! I always will be! Just fuck my mouth when we're done! I'll let you have complete control of my face! You can cum on it and down my throat, too! I'll want you to face fuck me as hard as you're pounding me now!"

"I'll pound your mouth so hard that you'll have to go see the pack healers after you swallow all my cum!" King said as he thrusted so hard that it caused Kate's fluids to splatter all over her hips as well as King's hips. There were so much of her fluids splattering that it was even on the ground that Kate and King were standing over.

"Fuck!" Kate screamed. "Pound your queen's pussy! Your dick is so big that I can barely take it much longer!"

"I won't be able to take it much longer before my…before my…ahh…yeah!" King screamed as he ejaculated, flooding Kate's pussy with so much of his fluids that they leaked out of her as he knotted her.

"Push that big knot in!" Kate commanded King as if she were in charge of him. "Harder! AHH, FUCK, it's huge!" Then, referring to his semen, Kate added, "It's so warm! It's filled up my whole pussy. It's overflowing!"

"The pups you have will be the dominant ones in this generation, Kate," King said, as they both panted loudly and drooled. Dogs of any species always drooled when they were in pleasure and these two were doing a lot of that now. King was drooling so much that it was coming out of his mouth in thick strands, and flowing down all sides of Kate's head. Kate wished this was his semen—after getting a facial—but she was content with the big load she'd just gotten in the pussy. She'd never gotten this much in her from a male before.

Kate seemed disappointed when King dismounted her, but that changed when she felt something different penetrating her pussy. It was soft and flicking in and out. She knew, without looking back, that King was eating her out, even if he'd have to deal with tasting his own fluids in addition to Kate's. It didn't bother him because he was undead, so his taste buds were dead, even though his reproductive system wasn't. The vampires had brought some of his body functions back when they'd revived him, but they'd left others dead such as his nervous system. None of the vampires felt pain. Of course, they'd done nothing to stop the wolves they'd revived from feeling pleasure.

"I know your pussy is sore from me pounding it," King said. "Let me help…" And then he went right back to licking her.

"Ohh!" Kate moaned louder than ever. "Lick my pussy! Make it wetter than it already is!" She didn't want to admit it, but King's tongue was causing her to experience more pleasure than his dick had. But she wouldn't tell him that. "Your tongue is so deep! Keep going, King!"

"Shake your ass while I lick your pink pussy..." King told him. "It'll make you cum on my face faster," he explained, then stopped talking entirely so he could focus entirely on eating his queen out. Kate started shaking her hips just as he told her to and she immediately realized how true it was. She was crying with more pleasure than ever, rubbing her pussy across his tongue as he ran it across her pussy. In Kate's mind, it was just like mutual masturbation, which was when both partners gave pawjobs to each other at the same time.

"Mmm!" Kate moaned quietly, but she got louder when he licked the most sensitive spot inside her pussy. "Oh yes! You lick my pussy so good!" Then she got a filthy idea. "Shove that tongue in my asshole, too!" King wasn't against this because of his dead taste buds, so he did, and it caused Kate to moan, but he went right back to eating her out since that caused the most pleasure. Her pussy was more sensitive than any other opening in her body, so he wanted to focus entirely on that. Nothing else.

"Your pussy tastes so good," King said unexpectedly, but somehow managed to keep licking her the entire time. "My cum is just like a cream filling," he added. That statement made Kate want to suck him off just to swallow it. She hoped it tasted like cream! She wanted his fluids to taste as sweet as King had made her feel, as he was making her feel now.

"Faster! Lick my pussy walls faster!" Kate ordered. "You've done nothing but what makes your new queen feel the best so far, so do that to make me feel even better!"

King was still licking so Kate wouldn't wonder if something was up, but he was getting suspicious about the looseness of her pussy. He knew that, if she was a virgin wolf as Dakota had told him, that Kate's pussy would be tighter. He hadn't thought about it when they'd mated, but now that he could see it…he really wondered if there was any truth to that. Then he remembered Humphrey and those three wolf pups—Runt, Claudette, and Stinky. They were Kate's puppies and she'd had them with Humphrey! Either she'd lied to him or Dakota had, but he was furious no matter what. He'd gotten a female wolf who'd already lost her virginity pregnant! Their puppies wouldn't be true vampires! They would be partially living puppies and half vampire puppies because she'd mated with a living wolf before becoming a vampire wolf!

"You lying whore!" King roared. "You've mated with other wolves before, haven't you?!" he added in a roaring voice. "Don't you tell me a lie, bitch!"

Kate now realized how, when Dakota had wondered aloud if she was married, that she'd told her ex-boyfriend that she was single. She hadn't remembered marrying Humphrey or giving birth to Runt, Claudette, and Stinky because she'd been so drunk after that fermented berry-eating contest. And now that mistake might come back to haunt her.

"I didn't know any better then, I swear!" Kate begged in a scared voice as King ran around front and towered over her. She was on her belly and he was standing up at full height. Well, full height for a wolf who was standing on all four of his legs, anyway. "I was extremely drunk then, so I hadn't remembered that I was married to Humphrey, and I didn't want to say anything to make you mad! I swear! I didn't lie to you intentionally!"

"You still lied to me!" King roared. "Your punishment wouldn't be nearly as severe if you'd told me from the start! You and Dakota are BOTH going to learn what happens when you lie to me!" He turned to the mouth of their den. "DAKOTA!" he roared. "GET IN HERE, NOW!"

Dakota came running into their den in an instant, only to be cuffed across the head, heavily, by King.

"What'd I do?!" Dakota asked in a panicked voice.

"You lied to me!" King roared.

"What?!"

"You'd told me that Kate hadn't mated before!" he snapped. "Why is it she has mated before? I noticed it when I was behind her doing things that make me SICK NOW!"

"She told me that she was single when I bit her!" Dakota said. "I wouldn't lie to you!"

"You still brought me a whore, not a virgin!" King continued ranting. "I want you to stay here for this, and then I am going to exile you for what is almost treasonous! You can't even follow an order as simply as FINDING ME ONE VIRGIN SHE-WOLF! You are useless, Dakota, and so are you, Kate!"

"W-what…are you going to do to me?" Kate whimpered.

"You won't leave this den alive," King said.

"No!" she wailed. "Anything but death!"

"Shut up!" he roared. "You lied to me and Dakota, so you have no reason to go on live! I wanted a pure she-wolf and he brings me you! You are worthless! You are trash! A wolf like you doesn't even deserve to breath as a vampire, let alone a living wolf!"

"Then just exile me!" Kate begged.

"No, I am going to make you BLEED!"

King lunged at Kate, pinning his former queen to the ground, and going from her throat. Kate was three-quarters the size of King, so she was easily overpowered, and he buried his massive fangs, including all of his normal teeth, into her neck. He mumbled, "Any last words?"

"Burn…in…hell…" Kate choked before getting her entire throat torn out by King, but that didn't kill her. King knew what would, as his former queen was bleeding out, but not weakening at all. There was so much blood but King didn't care about drinking it. He knew the best way to kill Kate, that he could do, was to tear off her head. They didn't have any wooden stakes, holy water, or such tools here, so decapitation was the only option.

"Good to know you can't talk anymore!" King roared. "I don't want to hear any more of your lies!"

King buried his claws into the open wound in Kate's neck and began pushing down on the bone with such a force that it broke after less than half a minute of him pushing down on her neck. But she wasn't dead yet—just crippled.

"You…are…dead!" King snarled and then tore Kate's head off with no effort at all. It was just flesh around a broken spinal column, so it was easy to tear through her flesh. The vampire form of Kate was dead, and he tossed her severed head off to the side like garbage. And that's all it was to him. It didn't mean shit to King, nor did her whorish body. King would have it burned to ashes later, but now he was going to deal with Dakota.

King called several more vampire wolves into his den—all males. They were all snarling at Dakota because they'd heard everything that was said.

"Get this scum out of my den," King ordered, and Dakota ran off, screaming, as the guards of King's den chased him away. He turned to Queen, who'd also come into his den.

"If you want to do something right…" King said slowly. "…you have to marry a wolf who was already purified of all past actions." Queen had been purified, of her pregnancy with Princess and all her deceased siblings, by the vampires when they'd dug up her corpse and used a spell to reanimate her. She was the equivalent of a virgin now that she was a vampire, unlike in life. "Your name is going to be a fitting one…my Queen…"


	15. New Life

**Chapter 14**

**New Life**

Melissa had gone into labor two months after the blood incident in the den of the vampires' leaders. Melissa was the former rogue Alpha from King's pack who'd come to Jasper with another rogue called Geoff to spy on the Jasper wolves. They almost killed Magril and her mate Liam at the pond near The Howling Rock, had been stopped by Princess and Fleet before having a chance to. Melissa had renounced her loyalty to King by joining the Jasper wolves, but Geoff didn't. And he was brutally killed by Kate for not renouncing his loyalty to King. Melissa proved herself and became an Alpha in the back when she'd played a large role in the deaths of both King and Queen, the former leaders of Banff who were now the leaders of the vampires, unbeknownst to any of the Jasper wolves. They weren't even aware that the vampires planned to destroy the body Kate when the next full moon arrived in a few weeks. They planned to do so by burning it to nothing but ashes.

Melissa was the mate of Hutch, whom she'd married shortly after the war with King's pack had come to an end. She'd almost died in that war shortly before the death of Queen, which she'd been part of, and wouldn't be alive now if it wasn't for Hutch. He'd stopped in the middle of a fight with another rogue for no reason other than to save her life. He would've died if Melissa had killed that rogue who'd wounded Hutch and the one he'd been fighting before risking his life to save her. That was why they'd fallen in love—because they'd saved each other's and not left each other alone during that last bloody battle with the rogues until she'd joined Princess, Runt, and Lilly in killing Queen, and later in killing King.

The only way Melissa could think of to partially get her mind off the excruciating pain of giving birth was to think about her even more painful past. Erase one pain with a worse one, as the saying went. Melissa was, just as Princess and her parents had been, born in Jasper Park in the Eastern Wolf Pack, also just as Princess and her parents had been. She was born an Alpha, again, just like the three former Alphas from Banff, two deceased and one still living. Melissa had gone to Alpha school with Princess when they were deemed old enough by their parents. She wished she could remember her parents' names because she'd loved them dearly and they'd loved Melissa as much as she'd loved them. It pissed her off that she could remember the name of those two heartless wolves, King and Queen, even the old name of King, which was Slash, but not her own parents' names!

Even if she couldn't remember the names of her mother or her father, she had many good memories with them. From the first moment she'd been able to see, hear, and smell—even if she'd still had no fur on her body then—she and her parents had loved each other dearly and had thought they'd always be together. They would be for a long time, but not in Jasper Park. After Kate almost died because of the actions of the Eastern Pack Wolves, the pack law prohibiting Alphas marrying Betas or Omegas was abolished by Kate and Humphrey, as the then new pack leaders, many of the Eastern Pack Wolves left Jasper. King, then known as Slash, hadn't just forced his mate, Queen, and their daughter, Princess, then known as Terra, to leave Jasper. He'd known Melissa's parents for a long time and they'd agreed to go with King's family to Banff, after some rather questionable actions on King's part.

King had threatened to have Melissa's parents executed if they didn't leave Jasper with the then only thirty now former Eastern Pack Wolves. He would've killed them in their sleep before leaving if they hadn't agreed to leave for Banff with him and the twenty-six other former Eastern Pack Wolves. They would've killed Melissa and her five siblings, two of whom were older, and two of whom were younger than she was. They'd only agreed to go for their puppies' sake. They weren't going to let some brutish, stuck up Alpha wolf kill them and their puppies over something so stupid. Banff had been easily defeated by the less than thirty adult wolves who'd attacked it because they'd just as easily defeated the former pack leaders. Before King and Queen had overthrown Banff, it was actually a great place for wolves to live. It was once a better park for wolves to call home than Jasper was. When they'd been the leaders of the wolf pack, Banff had been a step away from Hell for wolves. Things were much better for wolves there now that King and Queen were dead and that the pack's new dominant wolf was a female called Terry. She was everything King hadn't been as a pack leader and there weren't any slaves in Banff. Betas and Omegas were all treated equally and the former followers of King agreed with everything Terry had done. Anyone who didn't agree with her had been exiled to avoid tension between all of her pack members.

Melissa and her parents' thoughts had proven wrong sometime after they'd arrived in Banff, which was over a year or two after King and Queen had become the pack leaders. They wouldn't be together forever but until Melissa met a handsome male wolf whom she fell in love with. His name was Taylor and he was an Alpha wolf who'd been born in Banff. Him and his parents were the only survivors of the wolves who hadn't fled Banff. Many of them had become slaves and killed during the winter to supply a food source for the rogues. The rogues had become extremely cannibalistic during that first rough winter in Banff and they'd gone through a quarter of the slaves in those few months. The other three quarters were all dead and consumed within a year-and-a-half of King and Queen's conquering of Banff.

Although Melissa had fallen in love with Taylor, they'd not told their parents about their love because they were afraid to. They knew that the rouge Eastern Pack wolves and Banff Wolves were been supportive of arranged marriages and didn't want to bring up their love only to learn they'd have to marry someone else. And they could've been punished deciding whom they loved without getting their parents' consent first. It could've even caused a blood feud between the two families. And when blood was shed on a daily basis in Banff, a blood feud between two families was the last thing Melissa and Taylor had wanted to be responsible for starting.

Those damn blood sports were why so much blood had once been shed in Banff. Princess and Melissa had heard that Terry, the new, widowed pack leader of Banff, had outlawed The Blood Sports, and replaced them with something based on The Great Wolf Games of Jasper Park. Many of the rogues had supported this, surprisingly. And they were happy that there was no such thing as The Blood Sports in Banff anymore. But now, at the point of her life that Melissa was remembering now, The Blood Sports were the only sort of game allowed in Banff. The Great Wolf Games and any similarly peaceful game had been outlawed by King and Queen. Melissa had just lost one of her sisters to the daughter of the pack leaders, Princess, who was the only survivor, on this day so many years ago. And it had been her birthday, too! That was what had made that the shittiest day of Melissa's life since the day her parents had been forced to choose between moving to Banff or being executed.

Melissa's already hellish, and partially ruined life, got so much worse when the one wolf whom she'd thought she could trust stabbed her in the fucking back! Melissa and Taylor had been ratted out to both his and her parents and that caused the near equivalent of a fucking war! Not only were many members of Melissa and Taylor's families wounded, and even two from each killed, but they were at the throats of the two wolves who were in love with each other. The battle that had almost turned into a war between the wolves who supported Melissa's family and the wolves who supported Taylor's family ended when Taylor was killed by Melissa's parents.

Just that her father and mother had actually tortured and then murdered her true love so many years ago, Melissa had confronted her parents and condemned them in every way imaginable.

"What kind of parents are you?!" Melissa had wailed. "Not wanting your own daughter is one thing—FINE! But what kinda of scumbags murder their daughter's true love?! You are nothing to me! I wish you would both just die and then burn!"

"Burn in what?" her father had asked angrily.

"YOU CAN BURN IN HELL!" Melissa had roared. "And I hope you are happy with all those demons there because you two will fit in perfect with them!"

Her father had cuffed his daughter across the head in an abusive way. "I'll send you to hell now if you don't watch your mother, daughter!" he had growled at her. "You know the customs! You let your parents choose your spouse—you have no say in it! Now, I will choose your new mate for the future _tonight_, and you will be happy with him for the rest of your or you have no parents to keep you safe!"

"What?" Melissa had gasped.

"You heard me!" he had yelled at her. "So what is your decision?"

"I'll tell you my decision," she had said slowly, then paused for an entire minute. "You can take your customs and shove them, then go fuck yourself, _dad_!"

"You have no right to talk your father like that!" Her father had hit her so hard across the head for talking to him in such a way that he'd made his own daughter bleed from a gash in her head. "Now get back to your den and go to sleep."

Melissa had just stood there until her father had screamed at her. "NOW!" he had roared.

She'd returned to their den to sleep. She hadn't wanted to. Melissa would've much rather gone somewhere to be away from her dick of a father and bitch of a mother to mourn Taylor. Melissa had meant it when she'd told her father he could burn in Hell and go fuck himself. She wanted him to suffer for what he'd done to her true love and she would feel no remorse about condemning her own father. And she would feel no remorse about talking to him in the way she had, nor did she regret wishing death upon him. It would be the best thing that ever happened to her if that asshole got killed.

And on that night, Melissa had gotten her wish and a bit more because of who killed her scumbag parents. When her parents had been sleeping at the mouth of her den, and Melissa with her siblings at the back of the den, a male and a female wolf had snuck into the den unnoticed. They had suffocated her mother to death by shoving a rock into her mouth. They'd broken many of her teeth out with that rock in the process, too. And they hadn't stopped until the rock had been forced down her mother's throat. Then they'd moved over to her father, claws extended. While the female had covered his mother, her mate had slashed Melissa's father's throat open in so many places that he'd died immediately and bled out just as quickly.

The killers had been the parents of Taylor. And they hadn't come here just to kill the two wolves who'd murdered their son, Taylor. They'd come to murder the whole fuckin' family of the two wolves who took their only son, their only surviving pup, away from them for no reason at all. Even Melissa and she hadn't done anything to hurt their son. She never would've, but she'd also done nothing to help save their son's life. Melissa could've made all the difference in their minds. The truth was no one could've saved Taylor's life. He'd suffered too severe injuries. His throat had been slashed down to the bone and his ribcage had been left exposed. Lastly, Melissa's father had torn a gash in his belly that his entrails had almost fallen out of. Only a miracle could've saved no. No normal wolf could've done a damn thing to save him, but Taylor's parents had been so ignorant that they hadn't known that nothing could be done for their son.

But Melissa wasn't a stupid wolf. No Alpha was, except for her own parents and those two dumbasses who were Taylor's parents. She'd never met any Alpha who was as dumb as those four were. And they were adults?! They were more ignorant than a wolf who'd suffered a fucking concussion! She'd heard the whole thing but hadn't done anything to help her parents because she felt, to this day on which she was giving birth, that they'd both deserved to be murdered by the parents of the wolf whose son they'd murdered when he'd had his back turned.

But when they'd come after Melissa and her siblings, Melissa had thought that was too much, and she'd attacked them. She'd put up a hell of a fight, but in the end, all of her siblings were killed by those two fuckers. But she'd managed to blind the female in the left eye, tear off one of her ears, and break two of her paws—one on her left front leg, and one on her right hind leg. The male had been lucky to get away unharmed, carrying his lighter mate on his back to be taken care of by the pack healers. But he'd sworn that he could find Melissa in a vulnerable position one day and kill her just like they'd killed her parents and siblings.

He'd never get the chance because King's most loyal spies had heard this, and seen everything by the time it was too late to help. They'd passed the news onto King and Queen, who had Taylor's mother executed by having her limbs pulled off by the strongest Alphas in the pack, using the strongest vines. And Taylor's father was exiled after getting one of his eyeballs taken out by Queen. They'd ordered him to be killed if he was ever seen, by the guards, anywhere near the border of Banff. He was the biggest enemy to all the rogues, next to the Jasper wolves, for committing mass murder to an entire family—almost! Melissa was lucky to have survived the night her entire family was slaughtered and that was not the end of her hellish left.

Because she lived alone, she was always the target of abuse from the other wolves of her pack. The best example of this was when two males had attacked Melissa in her sleep. She'd been sleeping while all the other rogues had been far away from her den watching The Blood Sports in a small canyon in the ground when they'd attacked attack. So when they'd attacked her, no one had been there to hear it all happen. They'd raped her at the same time, one from behind and the other from in front. The male behind her had mated with her even though Melissa hadn't been in heat—therefore, unable to get pregnant—until she'd bled. She'd felt him climax in her twice, just as the male raping her mouth had done the same to her mouth. He'd made her swallow both times. When they'd stopped, she'd threatened to "bite their dicks off" if either of them put in her mouth again. They hadn't raped her again, but they gave her the worst beating of her life for threatening them.

Of course, King heard about this from Melissa soon as he'd returned from watching a round of The Blood Sports, and there was Hell to pay for those wolves who raped her. He had them castrated by the wolf known as MaKayla and her older brother, and then they'd been exiled. Those wolves didn't last very long outside of Banff. The one who'd raped Melissa orally was the first one to die. They had been attacked by a grizzly because they'd accidentally frightened her cub. He was torn to pieces, literally, and fed to the bear cub as a meal. And that bear mother hadn't intended to let the other one get off so easily, so she'd talked to some lone coyotes—an entire family of them—about this rogue who'd scared her cub. They were friends of this bear, so they'd gladly attack a wolf who threatened her cub. Well, they found him at the end of a box canyon, and they weren't easygoing with him. He hadn't stood a chance and they tore him limb from limb, and tore out every internal organ in his body. And those coyotes had sorted each of his organs based on what system in the body they belonged to. And to prove that they'd killed him, the father of this family of coyotes had brought that rogue wolf's head back to the mother bear to prove he was dead.

Melissa had always hated the ways of King and Queen, and all the other rogues, so she'd always wanted a reason to get out of Banff. She'd wanted to use a reason to get out of Banff, without arousing suspicion, that would give her the chance to not have to return. And she got that a year-and-a-half after her entire family was slaughtered. King himself had come to her with a request. Because his first spy sent to Jasper hadn't returned after an entire year, he'd wanted to send two more to Jasper to find out what happened to him, and to pick up where he'd left off. That was the perfect reason for her to get away from Banff for good, so she'd taken it. She had been sent to Jasper with a rogue Alpha called Geoff, the same age as her. They'd started their spying at the swimming hole located near The Howling Rock after finding the spy from a year before dead. Well, all they found was his skeleton. He'd died a long time ago.

But when they'd tried to kill those two wolves who'd just gotten married because the peacefulness of their marriage ceremony had made the two rogues sick, things didn't go well. Princess, a former rogue as well, and Fleet, the older brother of the she-wolf they'd tried to kill, had known they were there from the start. And they'd stopped the two rogues before they'd had a chance to kill the newlywed wolves—Magril and Liam. When she and Geoff had been brought before Kate, an Alpha, and her Omega mate Humphrey, she'd revealed her real reason for coming to Jasper. And that had angered Geoff so much that he'd said he would never be loyal to the Jasper wolves. And that was what had gotten him killed by Kate. She tore his throat out for it, claiming that if he wasn't going to renounce his loyalty to King, then he wasn't going to go on living in her territory.

"AHHHH!" Melissa screamed, as she pushed another puppy out of her already sore body. She'd given birth to now three puppies, but she was still in labor. She had no idea how many more puppies were on their way, but she hoped it was over soon! "This is the worst pain I've ever felt!" she complained. "Fuck, it hurts!"

Hutch had been there the entire time, obviously, trying to keep his mate calm. But it seemed that just his presence, and anything he'd say to her, just made her so much more angry. "It's going to be alright," he'd say, "just keep pushing and breathing, dear."

"HUTCH!" Melissa roared, as she saw the head of another pup come out of her. "I'm gonna rip you apart for doing this to me!" She was having a mood swing because of the pain she was experiencing.

The "doing this to me" Melissa was referring to was Hutch's actions. He was the one who'd gotten her pregnant, as her mate, over two months ago. She hadn't expected that giving birth would hurt so bad. Although she was happy to be a mother, it felt like she was being torn open every time she forced a puppy out of her body. It was no wonder that there was no much blood, between her hind legs, on the moss bed she was lying on. Melissa had gone into labor only half an hour ago and she hoped it would be over soon!

"Just keep breathing," Hutch tried to soothe is angry mate. But that made things worse.

"Shut up, Hutch! I KNOW!" she roared again. "Giving birth hurts my pussy more than mating did, Hutch, and you're telling me to fucking breath and push?! What kind of mate are you?!"

Hutch knew that Melissa didn't mean that. He knew it was just the pain talking and that she wouldn't be having these mood swings once she'd gotten the last puppy out. She'd had four already and he could see another one on the way.

_More screaming will be on its way, too,_ Hutch thought nervously. He was actually worried that Melissa would try to tear him apart because when she said something, she meant it. Melissa wasn't the kind of wolf who joked when she was saying something like that. She was going to tear Hutch apart because she was being torn apart by the process of giving birth! Melissa wanted to make it so he couldn't get her pregnant again, because she was in that much pain due to her pregnancy. These puppies would be the only good thing that happened to Melissa because of being pregnant. She'd had so many mood swings and cravings for the oddest foods, both at the oddest of times, that it had gotten annoying for her and Hutch, even if she couldn't control her cravings or mood. But now, her anger had reached its peak, and she couldn't control it anymore. Melissa rarely cursed, but she was definitely being vulgar in this moment. And Hutch couldn't blame her for the way she was screaming and cursing at him.

"Son of a bitch!" Melissa screamed. "Please make it stop! I need them out of me, NOW!" And that seemed to do it. Her fifth and last puppy was out of her body. Now, as she laid her head down, breathing heavily due to all the physical pain she was in, Melissa thought about how bad she felt for Mica and her mother. They'd both given birth to massive lives. Most wolves gave birth to four to six puppies, even though the maximum was eighteen. Banja, now deceased, had given birth to Mica and her _seventeen_ youngest siblings. Mica had also given birth to eighteen puppies. Melissa couldn't bear to think about how bad it must've been for Mica and her late mother to go through birthing that many puppies. Five had torn Melissa apart, or at least that's what she thought it had done based on how she felt down there, so she couldn't bear to, and didn't want to, think about what eighteen would do to her body!

"You're going to be alright now," Hutch whispered on his mate's ear, as the fluid covered, blind, deaf, and naked puppies found their way to Melissa's belly to drink her milk. "It's all over."

Melissa growled. "Oh, fuck you, Hutch," she said in pained voice, then realized that was what had caused this. "No, I take that back…that's what put me through all this pain in the first place!"

_But at least it's over,_ she thought, _and I'll never have to go through this again!_


	16. Inadvertent Spying Goes Wrong

**Chapter 15**

**Inadvertent Spying Goes Wrong**

"Mommy, I'm hungry!" the young female wolf pup cried, as did her siblings.

These five pups were the five three-month-old pups of Melissa and Hutch. It was hard for the relatively new parents to believe that they'd been able to go three months without a single conflict with the vampire wolves. Maybe they'd finally given up and decided to leave the living wolves alone. Of course, common sense told them that no evil beings would give up that easily. King had never given up when he was alive, not until he was killed, so why would these vampires give up?

Melissa and Hutch were the parents of five puppies—two sons and three daughters. The daughters' names were Rhea, Mia, and Bella, from oldest to youngest, and the two sons' names were Blaze and Howler, from oldest to youngest. Rhea was older than all of them, but she was only older than Blaze by a few minutes. After Blaze, Howler had been born, then Mia, and lastly Bella. Rhea and Blaze, the oldest, were Alphas, just like their mother. Mia, Bella, and Howler were all Betas, just like their father.

Melissa spoke in a tone that she'd never spoke in before she gave birth. It was that calm, soothing tone that was only used by wolf mothers around their puppies or when someone was trying to console someone who was mourning. Claws had spoken in that very tone when she'd consoled Humphrey over the death of Kate, just as he'd done for her after the war with the rogues was over. He'd consoled Claws for days without end after Scar had been killed by the rogues. She would've killed herself had it not been for Humphrey and for Claws learning she'd been pregnant with her six puppies—Dahlia, Kara, Christina, Jordon, Justin, and Scar.

"What would you six like?" Melissa asked them with a cooing affect on her voice. And that led to a frenzy of requests for her and Hutch's puppies. When things calmed down, it was clear what each of them wanted. The three girls all wanted a fish from the river—not one Kate had died in since that had been ordered off limits by Princess and Runt after they'd learned it was contaminated with Kate's infected blood. Her vampire blood. That was what had killed Garth and a few others so many months ago and left Lilly a widow. She had to raise her puppies—Kelsie, Kaylee, Maddie, Cody, and Cooper—without a father, without Garth, by her side. Melissa always prayed at night that such a fate would never befall her and Hutch.

And the two boys wanted either fish or caribou meat. Blaze wanted caribou meat, feeling like fish was for "immature" pups, while Howler wanted fish. Blaze was the only of the five pups who thought that fish was for the immature, but he'd learn eventually that even the adult wolves ate fish quite often. It wasn't just something that young wolf pups ate. And he must've forgotten that he wasn't the oldest, but the second oldest. Rhea was the oldest and, even though Blaze never wanted to admit to it, she was more mature than him or any of the other pups in their litter. Playful arguing amongst the pups was always something they did when they weren't play fighting, eating, or sleeping. They'd always argue in a harmless way about the most random things possible until Melissa or Hutch, rarely both of them, got tired of hearing them bickering, and told them to go do something else. But maybe bringing them a bit more than what they usually ate would make them sleepy and then they could have some peace and quiet to themselves.

* * *

There were two rivers in Jasper Park. One large one that connected to the majority of the rivers in Jasper and one isolated one that stretched for a third the distance the other one did. The larger of the two rivers was the one where Kate had been killed so many months ago and it had been contaminated by her blood, so the wolves were afraid to drink out of it. It had caused the deaths of Garth and five other wolves in their pack. There wasn't a wolf in Jasper who didn't avoid that river since Princess had announced that it was contaminated with the blood of a vampire. Of course, since everyone knew that Kate had died in that river, they knew it was her blood that had contaminated it.

Melissa and Hutch were just arriving at the smaller river in Jasper, which was still uncontaminated. No corpses of wolves had been found in this river yet, so everyone was sure that it wasn't contaminated. And not many wolves had come here before now, so it was very unlikely that anyone would've been found dead in this river before now.

The two wolves knew that fishing took patience for animals, even bears, which were better at it than any other animal in existence. No one could out fish bears, especially grizzly bears. Not many wolves could fish, but Melissa was almost expert at it. She'd once lived with a female grizzly bear who had taught her how to catch fish. She hadn't let Melissa return to her den until she'd gotten perfect at catching fish. It took her two days to do so and by then, Melissa had been fishing as good as any bear ever had. She was the first wolf in all of Canada to fish as good as a bear. At least, she was the first one in many years to have done so.

Hutch knew this part of Melissa's history, as well as everything else she'd gone through in her life, so he was letting her handle the fishing and he would just help if she needed him. Of course, he doubted that he'd be much of a help. Hutch didn't know a whole lot about fishing. Not many wolves did. Melissa was one of the few who did. Princess was another, but she'd tough herself many years ago, back when she was an outcast from Banff for defending herself by killing another rogue who'd forced her to perform oral on him. She'd castrated him and then tore his throat out, an act that her parents, King and Queen, had considered murder. They'd exiled her from Banff for it, hoping she would die in the wild. But she'd survived because she was a smart wolf. She'd taught herself how to fish rather quickly, without the help of a bear at first, and had become good at quickly. She became perfect at it when a young grizzly mother had saved Princess's life from a lone scout from Banff. That bear had seen Princess fishing and had sensed there was something special about her.

"Hutch, give me a paw," Melissa said, eyeing a fish that was trapped between two rocks. She'd made a trap out of those two rocks and some net-like mosses. She'd stretched the mosses around the two rocks, already there when the two wolves had arrived, to make what humans called a "fish net." The fish could swim into it after the worms she put in there, but they couldn't get back out because of a fishing spider that Melissa had put in there. It was harmless to wolves, but deadly to fish. It stayed there and when the fish was trapped in the moss, the spider would go after it, and bite the fish with, injecting it with venom that was only deadly to the fish. Meaning that even if it bit her—this would never happen since fishing spiders never attacked wolves—Melissa would be perfectly fine. And the venom in the dead fish wouldn't even harm them if they ate that fish. It wasn't potent enough to kill anything but fish, hence the name, "fishing spider." This species only ate fish and sometimes insects, as all spiders did.

Patiently, Melissa and Hutch watched the six-spotted fishing spider (_Dolomedes triton_) wait for the fish to take the worm bait from the moss. Just like wolves, this spider, ironically related to the more aggressive wolf spider, the fishing spider was patient, and waited out of sight. It was hunting in the same fashion that wolves did, waiting out of sight, silently, for its prey to come into range. The two wolves found it interesting that such a small animal hunted in the same way that they, much larger animals, did. And it did it all by itself rather than in a pack. It seemed that the only difference between the hunting style of a wolf and a fishing spider was wolves were social hunters while fishing spiders were antisocial hunters.

"Oh, that fish is gonna get it now," Melissa said in a slow, anxious voice. "It doesn't even know what's gonna hit him…" There was a snap as the spider lunged onto the fish. The fish thrashed as the fishing spider buried its fangs into the fish's flesh. It was dead in a minute. "Oh, did you see that?!" Melissa yelped with excitement. "That spider took that fish out faster than us wolves take down a caribou!" She reached down there with her paw and snatched the fish form the spider, which hissed at her as she dropped its prey onto the shoreline. The spider, like wolves, was smart and had expected this. But it hadn't expected them to do it four more times.

When a fifth fish came along, they let the spider keep that one not only because it was starting to get aggressive, but also because their fifth pup hadn't wanted a fish. He'd wanted some caribou meat, which meant their work was done. They'd just need to go to where food was stored by the pack and get permission to take some caribou meat for their pup. They'd done it before, and usually didn't take that much, so Melissa and Hutch were sure the wolves who watched over the storage cave wouldn't mind that much.

"Do you hear someone talking?" Melissa asked Hutch, as she went to pick up the fish.

"No, why?" he asked her.

"I swore I heard voices coming from somewhere nearby," she said. "It sounds like a gathering of wolves in a cave. Should we go check it out? Are pups aren't expecting us back for a while, since we're ahead of schedule thanks to that fishing spider."

"I guess we could," Hutch sighed, "but let's be quick about it. I have a bad feeling about this. You know, the vampire wolves…we have seen a sign of them since you gave birth. They could be up to something."

"We'll be as quite as that spider," Melissa said. "Now come on before we don't have a chance."

Melissa followed the voices and Hutch followed her, still not hearing them, until they found a cave that had wolf paw prints outside it. Now, Hutch heard the voices, and they both knew it was the vampire wolves just because of the accent the voices had. Vampires, because some of their body was dead, spoke in odd voices because their condition affected their vocal chords in an odd way.

In the cave, there was a fire burning, and the headless body of a female wolf lying not far away. Her severed head was right next to her lifeless body. It was…

"Kate…" Melissa whispered with shock. "She was a vampire herself, so why'd they kill her?"

"I don't know," Hutch whispered back. "Let's just keep quiet and watch…"

They could see and smell that Kate's decapitated corpse was rotting, which meant that they must've killed her sometime ago. But why? She was a vampire just like that. Maybe she'd done something against their "pack law" and she'd been executed for it. But then why would they wait so long to burn her body? Melissa assumed that rotting flesh burned better, but she had no idea, honestly. This was disturbing to watch, for both her and Hutch, but they would be seen if they left now.

A large wolf came into view and they recognized him immediately.

"King!" Melissa gasped.

"Quiet," Hutch whispered and they ducked out of sight just as the vampires looked toward the mouth of the cave.

The two living wolves heard one of the vampire wolves say, "There's nothing there! Let's worry about burning this body now!" Melissa and Hutch, relieved that they hadn't been seen, knew that was King talking.

"He's the Alpha male?" Hutch gasped. "And that means Kate must've been his queen until he found out she wasn't a virgin…and he killed her for it. And that must mean Queen, the wolf, is the Alpha female! She was nothing but a skeleton, so that means she has an all new body, which makes her a virgin!"

"Just keep quiet," Melissa instructed in a whisper. "We'll get away if they don't know we're here…"

"Oh, will you know?" They heard a raspy female voice behind them that sent chills down their spines. Even with the inflection on her voice that came with being a vampire, they still knew who it was. Queen! "What are you two doing here?" she asked them when they turned to face her. "Are you spying on us?"

"Not intentionally!" Melissa said in a begging voice. "We were here getting food for our puppies when we thought we heard voices and so we followed them, not knowing who they belonged to. And we weren't going make ourselves known…"

"Prove that you weren't here to spy on us," Queen said, "and I'll let both go home to your puppies."

"Look!" Melissa pointed with her paw. "Those are the four fish we captured by the river! Four of puppies had wanted fish and one of them had wanted caribou meat, I swear. I'd never spy on anyone intentionally unless given orders, which neither of us have! We haven't even seen our pack leaders today and we wouldn't take orders to spy on anyone from anyone but our pack leaders!"

"I believe you," Queen said, "but that doesn't mean you weren't spying intentionally. Just because your pack leaders didn't give you orders to spy on us doesn't mean you didn't want to!"

"What?!" Melissa gasped.

"You will be both be killed and burned with Kate…" Queen went on.

"Melissa, RUN!" Hutch roared. He tackled Queen, throwing her and himself right into the fish that was meant for their puppies. He was clawing into Queen, drawing blood, brown blood, not red, that sprayed his face and the grass.

"Hutch! I won't leave you!" Melissa wailed.

"JUST GO!" Hutch roared again. "I'll catch up with you, I promise!"

Melissa ran off, but when she heard a scream, she turned around to a horrifying sight. Hutch was no longer on top of Queen, relentlessly clawing her body. She was on top of him, doing the same that he'd been doing to her. And her wounds had already healed! There was now so much red blood—Hutch's blood—all over her and the grass as she lowered her head to Hutch's ear.

"I hope your blood tastes better than you can fight," he whispered. Queen extended her fangs then buried them into Hutch's neck, as he screamed in pain.

Melissa screamed in a different kind of pain than Hutch was and ran away in tears before she could be seen by the other vampires who'd come out of the cave. She didn't look back—she couldn't.


	17. Nytmen's Past

**Chapter 16**

**Nytmen's Past**

Unaware of the situation involving Melissa and Hutch, Nytmen had called Claws to his den to talk to her about something he'd told no one. It was something that everyone wanted to know. He was going to tell only Claws because he feared something bad would soon happen to him. If he died, he didn't want his story to be forgotten.

Claws didn't know why he'd brought her here yet, but she assumed it was probably to get at her again in another attempt to eat her out like he'd tried to when they'd first met. That was after he'd saved her life at the river where she'd found Kate dead.

"Why did you bring me here?" she asked. "It's not to pleasure me again, is it?"

"No, no," Nytmen said. "Nothing like that. In case I die…"

"What?" Claws gasped. "You aren't going to die. No one else is."

"Hear me out, Claws," he continued. "In case I die, I want you to know why I'm the way I am."

"Why you're the way you are? What?" Claws was confused.

"You know, why I'm half vampire, half wolf?" he explained, clearing her confusion up. "It happened many years ago, when we'd be young adult wolves. My mate had given birth to puppies four months earlier, in Red Deer Park, when it happened. I'd seen some odd-acting wolf not far from where we'd lived."

"What happened?" Claws asked.

"When I asked his name," Nytmen went on, "he'd just acted as if he hadn't heard me and ran off. So, as any father concerned for his puppies would do, I followed him, expecting to find him. But he found me and it didn't end well after a while."

Nytmen hesitated, but Claws urged him to go on. "I fought the wolf, not knowing he was a vampire, because I'd thought he was a rogue from Banff who'd come to Red Deer Park to spy on us and to kill puppies. Being the father I was, I wasn't going to let anyone harm my puppies, mate, and I wasn't going to let King take over another part. But when he bit me, I knew what he was then because I'd felt as if he'd been drinking my blood. But I pulled away and knew, from horror stories told in Red Deer Park, what I had to do to kill him."

"What was that?" Claws asked not because she didn't know already—he'd told her all the ways to kill a vampire many months ago—but because she was too caught up in the story to remember that in this moment.

"I grabbed the nearest 'weapon' I could find, which had been a decent-sized rock," he went on, "and I knocked the vampire senseless before I broke his ribcage open with it, and tore out his heart." He paused, and then continued. "Of course, I knew what being bitten by a vampire meant because of those same horror stories—I would become one of them. So I hid the body where no one would find it, and I returned to my family, told my mate what happened. I still remember how devastated she'd been when I told her I would be dead within minutes to an hour. I'm sure you can understand, having lost a mate, what she was going through then, but something odd and unexpected had happened."

"What?" Claws asked. Her eyes were wide with interest and she was setting on her haunches with her legs stuck out in front of her like a pup at Alpha school who was listening to her teacher.

"I died, it had seemed, but then I'd returned to life a different wolf. I was like a vampire, yet I had all the emotions of a living wolf who wouldn't hurt anyone but those who attack him. Of course, having the strengths of a vampire came with a price you already know—I'm forced to drink the blood of the living to survive, just not as often as full-blown vampires must. And you are the only reason I am alive, as you have sacrificed some of your own blood for me, and given me the blood from all the weasels and stoats you kill."

"Those rodents are just bothersome little shits," Claws spat. "I'm glad to give them to you and watch them suffer before we kill them. Of course, I always tear the hearts out and decapitate them so they don't turn into vampires. Weasels and stoats drink enough blood from animals as it is. I can't begin to imagine what they'd be like as vampires!"

Claws changed the subject before he could speak again. "So what led to you becoming a 'vampire hunter'?" she asked.

"My family," Nytmen said. "I become one to protect my family. I'd killed every vampire in Red Deer Park and made sure there was no chance in Hell that it would happen again. So when I heard rumors of the same thing happening here, I came to Jasper and that's when I found you being attacked by that vampire at the riverside. I saved your life and I knew from that moment on that the rumors were true. And I also knew that you would be the one to help me defeat the vampires. I just sensed something about you that only wolves such as myself, who hunt these vampires, have. You have the bravery of a wolf such as myself, yet you've never killed a vampire or fought with one."

"What are you saying, Nytmen?" Claws asked.

"I'm saying that you might have," he explained, "in a paste life, been a hunter of vampires like myself. I can even assume who you were. A vampire hunter wolf called Raven, who greatly resembled you, lived in Jasper Park over two hundred years ago, and she'd met a similar fate as I did. Also just like me, she hunted all of the vampires in Jasper into extinction to protect her family and her pack from them. But, during her last battle with the Alpha female of the vampires, she was bitten by the queen, and that was what killed the queen, but she'd also suffered fatal injuries. She died, surrounded by her family, one of whom I believe was your distance ancestors."

"So you're saying that I hunted vampires in a past life over 200 years ago?" Claws asked, still setting on her haunches. "You expect me to believe that?"

"I'm not going to force you to believe it," Nytmen said, "but wolves rarely perfectly resemble another wolf from so many years apart. I have every reason to assume that you were her in a past life and you'll follow in your past life's pawsteps, and make vampires extinct in Jasper Park again."

"You're the vampire hunter, not me, so why do you believe that I'm some vampire hunter wolf from 200 years ago just because we look the same?"

"Claws, listen," he said. "You have the same green eyes she had, your orange fur is the same in every way as her's had been, and you have the same fowl temper that she had. There are no differences between you and here that I can observe. Believe me. I would not lie to someone about something like this."

"Fine," Claws said, convinced. "I believe you, but I hope that it doesn't come to me fighting the Alpha female, whoever she might be, whether it's Kate or some other vampire bitch."

"There is one thing I didn't tell you about myself before," Nytmen said suddenly.

"What?" she asked.

"When I returned to Red Deer Park after traversing the country for some time, I learned that my family had been killed by a vampire female who I'd not found during my search of Red Deer Park. She'd been hidden away by the vampires, as a part of their plan to stay in Red Deer Park, and killed my family when she knew I'd been away. So I'd challenged her to combat and I left her without a head. I burned her body to ashes, and then never returned to Red Deer Park. My entire family is dead, so I had no reason to return there. I haven't forgotten what happened to them and I'll never forgive myself for what happened."

"Is something wrong?" Claws asked when she noticed how weak Nytmen looked. He wasn't very weak looking, yet he wasn't as healthy looking as usual.

"I need blood," Nytmen said, "and I'm sure you know what I mean."

"Yes, I do," Claws said. She got on her back just like before—only because that was the most comfortable position for this—and did not move as Nytmen cut her paw with a sharp stone. If he'd bitten or scratched her, she would've turned into a half-vampire like him. He flicked up her blood with his tongue, so he wouldn't infect her, while still getting all the benefit from the blood, until he felt like him old self again.

Nytmen remembered how he'd attempted to perform oral on Claws the last time she'd allowed him to drink her blood. She hadn't known him as well then, had screamed at him, and cursed him out for it. He'd learned how vulgar she really could be then. But maybe since they were much closer than before, he could at least get away with relieving some stress. He didn't know if Claws would let his tongue penetrate her, but he knew she'd let him get away with kissing and licking her neck, breast, and belly.

Claws hadn't expected him to start necking her and she gasped. "What are you doing?"

"It won't be like before," he said. "I swear."

"Fine," Claws said in a calm voice, then closed her eyes, and enjoyed the feeling of him sucking on her neck. She thought about things, too dirty to describe, that involved sucking, as he sucked on her neck. She wanted to suck on other things, but not of a half vampire wolf because of the potential danger. She was thinking about Scar again. But not in sadness, like she used to think after he was murdered by the rogues so many years ago.

Even though he eyes were closed, she could feel that Nytmen had skipped kissing her breast and gone straight for her soft underbelly. She moaned as he literally kissed her belly and ran his tongue along it. His actions, as they had when they first met, made Claws horny. Much more horny than before, too, since they'd gotten to know each other. He'd saved her life and given her pack so much hope for stopping these vampires. And because he'd told her how he'd learned that his entire family had been slaughtered, she wasn't going to be as harsh with him or as nervous around him for kissing her on the belly. She knew he was going lower every few minutes and he didn't stop until he reached the spot on her body that would give her the most pleasure. He stopped before doing anything.

Claws opened her eyes. She had a look that said, "Why'd you stop now?" Nytmen knew that's what she was thinking.

"I don't want you to get angry at me," Nytmen admitted. "We're close, but not as mates. We're close as friends, or brothers, are close. I'd never do anything you don't want."

"Do it," Claws said, then told him how horny she was when he asked why. It was in that moment that Nytmen saw how went she was and assumed that she'd reached her "climax" sometime when he'd been kissing her belly. That would explain why he'd felt a wetness on his chest, but he'd been so caught up in his actions that he'd not given it any concern.

"Are you sure?" Nytmen wearily asked.

"Yes," Claws said. "Eat me! Make me feel good…no one has ever done this to me, or been willing to, so just do it so I can get my curiosity of how it feels out of the waaaaay! Oooh…Nytmen!" she moaned when he started licking her. "You're so good at thiiiiiiiis! Oooh…Nytmen…keep licking…you're great at this!" She went on a tirade of pleasured moans when she spoke. "Oh, yes! Your tongue is so deep…please, don't stop licking me! Don't stop until my fluids all over your muzzle! This feels better I ever thought it could!"

Claws had never moaned this louder when she'd pleasured herself. She perfectly understood why so many females enjoyed this. "Oh…NYTMEN!" Claws let out a load moan of pleasure. "Watch out, Nytmen!" she warned him. "Here it comes!" Then she let out a piercing scream of ecstasy. "Ohhh…yes…yes…YES!"


	18. Dakota!

**Chapter 17**

**Dakota!**

"Oooh…Nytmen, fuck me HARD as you can!" the female moaned. "Oh, Nytmen! Don't stop fucking me. I'm almost there…Oh…ah…yeah…"

"Oh, baby, you're so wet!" the male moaned.

"Don't stop thrusting! Don't stop!"

"I-I'm almost there…I'm almost there!" he said, and then yelled with extreme pleasure. "Yeesssssssss!"

The male was Nytmen and he collapsed on top of Claws, whom he was behind. They were both panting heavily, this act of love having taken all of their energy away. A few minutes later, they'd regained enough energy to move. Nytmen got off of her and lay down next to her.

"Oh, Nytmen," the orange she-wolf moaned, "you were great! You wore me out and that's not easy to do," she added.

"You wore me out too," he said, "and I hope are puppies are just like you because you're a strong wolf." He was talking in a more serious tone after saying that she'd worn him out. "They'll need to be strong pups if we don't stop these vampires in the next two to two-and-a-half months." Nytmen said that because the gestation period of a wolf was 62 to 75 days, which was just over two months to just under two-and-a-half months. It made Claws question her sanity of having a one-night stand with Nytmen, when the chance of her giving birth to his puppies, if she was in heat, which she doubted greatly. She questioned her sanity because of the vampires. It wouldn't be safe to nurse and raise puppies in a word like this.

Claws was referring to how long Nytmen had eaten her out, and how good he'd done it to her, as well as how much pleasure he'd made her feel when he'd mated with her. She'd never thought getting eaten out would feel as good as it had. She wished that Scar had been more willing to eat her out, and that she'd been more willing to accept it, when he was alive. She was in a pleasured stupor, thinking about how having a dick penetrate her down there felt better than having his tongue penetrate her down there. She'd rather get eaten out when she's horny than get fucked or masturbate when she was horny. And she'd never thought that any other male would be good at mating with her since Scar died. She hoped she'd have Nytmen's puppies _after_ they did away with the vampire threat.

"Now, do you believe that you were once a vampire hunter wolf in a past life?" he asked her.

She was breathing heavily, but Claws was capable of answering him. "Yes, I do," she said. "I believe you. And I believe you know how to make this vampire hunter feel very good!"

In that moment, Claws mood changed. She swore she heard someone shouting. So did Nytmen. It was coming out of his den.

"What on Earth is that?" she asked him.

Nytmen perked his ears up and listened because he had better hearing than even Claws. "It sounds like someone is yelling about…oh no…a vampire!"

"What?!" Claws yelped and was up in an instant, having all but forgotten that she'd been eaten out. She had more energy than ever all of a sudden, as she and Nytmen ran out of his den.

Sure enough, there was a vampire being chased by multiple living wolves who seemed to be less afraid of him than he was afraid of them. He was screaming about how he just wanted to be left alone. But the Eastern and Western wolves who were chasing didn't heed his words anyway. Nytmen had made it known that this wolf was the one who had killed Kate. It was Dakota, her ex-boyfriend from Alpha school, who had mated with her at the main river in Jasper before killing and infecting her.

Nytmen was familiar with this vampire, this Dakota. He'd been hunting him as long as he'd been in Jasper, which was over a year. He'd been here for an entire year, unbeknownst to the Jasper wolves. No one had known that Nytmen had been in Jasper hunting the vampires for the past year. This was the first time there'd been any reported incidents, any sightings, and the first time anyone had ever seen Nytmen. Nytmen had told them exactly what Dakota looked like and to keep an eye out for him. And now that they'd found him, the Jasper wolves were hell bent on killing him for killing at least eight wolves. They'd found his scent at where Kate was killed by the river, as well as where both Banja and Griffin had been killed. And, because he'd killed Kate and left her body in the river to contaminate it with her blood, he was also responsible for the deaths of Garth and a few other wolves. For those reasons, the deaths of Kate and Garth, Lilly was among the wolves chasing this coward of a vampire.

And Mica was there to, not because he'd killed her father, whose guts she hated anyway, and would never mourn, but because Dakota had been one of the vampires who'd killed her mother. She'd loved her mother almost as much as she loved Stinky, her mate, and Scarlet, her best friend. And almost as much as she loved the puppies whom she had with Stinky. They were past their adolescent stage of life and were almost adults now.

Claws looked at Nytmen, whom she couldn't consider her new mate because they hadn't official married. There was a difference between mating, especially a one-night stand like what they had, and marrying. She had an evil look in her eyes that implied she'd even forgotten about her sexual encounter with Nytmen—both of them.

"Let's get him," she growled. "He's the fucker who killed Kate, dumped her body in the river that is now contaminated, and therefore killed Garth and several others! We'll kill him!"

"Be careful, Claws," Nytmen said. "I don't want to lose you." He wasn't just saying that because he'd mated with her, but also because he loved her as a mate, and cared for her. There wasn't a wolf in Jasper he'd developed as close of a relationship to in the past few months. If she ever were in danger of dying, he would sacrifice himself for Claws as any good mate or close friend would. Of course, neither of them had intentions of revealing they'd had taken part in a one-night stand until after this was all over.

"You'd better be careful, Nytmen" Claws spat sourly. "I can take care of myself, ancestor of a wolf-vampire hybrid who was a vampire hunter, or not. I don't need anyone's help to stay alive. I never have and, damn it, I never will. You'd better not try to help me unless I _really_ need it!"

"Let's tear him to pieces," Nytmen growled. He wouldn't bring that up again.

Claws and Nytmen took off together, running side-by-side until the joined the small group of wolves who were already chasing Dakota. Even for a vampire wolf, he'd been running for a long time, and he was more tired than the living wolves chasing him were. He'd underestimated their determination by running the entire time since he'd been banished by King for bringing him Kate, a female who wasn't a virgin as he'd requested of him. He was lucky that King hadn't killed him for it like he'd killed Kate.

Claws wasn't a member of the hunting group of the united Eastern and Western Wolf Packs for nothing. She was one of the best hunters between the two packs and had been chosen back when they were rivals. She'd been the leader of the now united hunting group for years and the leader of the Eastern Wolf Pack's hunting group for even longer. Now that they'd united, all of the wolves in the pack had agreed that she was the best wolf for the task. Claws was proving that now.

"DAKOTA!" she roared, as she lunged through the air. Nytmen followed Claws out of concern for the life that could be growing in her womb. But even if she weren't possibly pregnant, he would've followed her anyway. Because of her past life, two hundred years ago, as a hybrid of the vampires and the living, Nytmen had an inseparable bond with Claws. He didn't want to be away from her…ever. They were equals in every way but their temper. He was usually a cool-headed wolf, but Claws was just a bomb waiting to go off.

She'd lunged for Dakota, who yelped when he felt two large wolves land on his back. It was Claws and Nytmen. They effortlessly brought him to the ground, where he didn't even fight them. Instead, he begged for his life, not knowing that they knew so much about what he'd done, starting with killing Kate.

"No!" Dakota screamed. "Don't kill me! Spare me! Spare me!"

"Why?" Claws snarled. "You didn't spare Kate! And because you dumped her body in the river, after you infected her, her blood contaminated the river. And several wolves drank from that river and DIED because of you! Fucking bastard!"

"One of those wolves who died is my mate!" Lilly was growling at Dakota. Her gums were showing.

"And Kate was my mate!" Humphrey snarled. "You took advantage of a vulnerable wolf and mated with her just so you could turn her into a vampire!"

Melissa seemed to appear out of nowhere. She was in tears. "And because he didn't bring King a virgin," she cried, "King, the vampires' Alpha male—" Everyone gasped at that statement. "—decapitated Kate. Hutch and I were out gathering food for our puppies when we came across a den in the Western Territory where all the vampires—at least fifty—were gathered! Queen is their Alpha female and she…she…SHE KILLED HUTCH! He s-sacrificed himself so I could get away…"

"I have nothing to do with that!" Dakota pleaded.

"The hell you don't!" Melissa roared. "If you hadn't turned Kate into a vampire, she wouldn't have gone to King and gotten killed, then they wouldn't have been there to burn her body! And then Hutch and I wouldn't have spied on them! You are to blame for all this and I WANT TO FUCKING KILL YOU!" she roared. "Let me at him! I'll tear his fucking eyes out and shove them up his ass, and pull his fucking entrails out!"

"I think there is one wolf who should have the choice of killing him," Nytmen said angrily. "He's the first wolf to lose a loved one."

"Me?" Humphrey gasped. Yet he was glad Nytmen said this and so many others agreed. He'd have his chance to avenge Kate. King was the one who killed her as a vampire and destroyed her body, but it was Dakota, this piece of shit who was begging for his life like a fucking coward, who'd killed Kate when she'd been alive. He was why Kate was a vampire. "I'll gladly kill him," Humphrey added in a stronger voice. "And I'll enjoy every moment of it."

Nytmen had a sort of blade with him. It was made from the sharpened rib bone of a deceased grizzly bear. He'd sharpened it to the point of being a knife and had attacked it to a piece of wood. The "handle" had been built by Nytmen in such a way that it was easy for a wolf to use it, whether standing on two legs or on four legs.

"And so he doesn't go anywhere," Nytmen snarled, "I'll do this…" He took his blade and dug in through Dakota's flesh, leaving a massive bleeding gash from his ribcage to his belly. Dakota screamed, but didn't have a chance to speak before Humphrey lunged. He landed on top of Dakota and put his fangs to his throat.

"Don't!" Nytmen warned suddenly. "You'll get infected! Biting a vampire will either turn you into one or kill both of you!"

"Then what I do?!" Humphrey almost yelped.

"Take this." Nytmen passed his blade to Humphrey, who immediately took it. He went axe crazy, almost literally, and began stabbing Dakota repeatedly in the throat and breast. He broke several ribs with the blade and almost punctured his heart.

"How do you kill him?!"

"Decapitation and stabbing him in the heart are the best ways to kill a vampire," Nytmen said.

Nytmen almost didn't have a chance to finish his sentence before there was a spray of blood all over his and Claws's faces. It was as a result of Humphrey driving the blade into Dakota's heart. Just as quickly as he'd done that, he'd taken the blade and cut with it until Dakota's head was cut clean off. Humphrey had used it to cut through the bone attacking his head to his body, and then he'd used his paws to tear it off. He threw it away with disgust. He started to gut Dakota's dead body with it, but Claws took it away after Dakota's stomach was cut out and sliced open.

"At least Kate will be able to rest in peace," Nytmen said. "You not just killed her murder, but you devastated his corpse."

"It won't bring her back," Humphrey whimpered.

"And it won't bring back Garth or Hutch," Melissa whispered. Humphrey had moved away from Dakota's corpse and they were holding each other in their front legs, crying. Melissa didn't care if she was getting blood on her. She and Humphrey could just take baths later. They wanted to mourn their mates now, who had once or would join the ranks of the vampires.

Claws approached Nytmen and licked his cheek almost affectionately. "We must end this soon," she said, "before anyone else dies."


	19. Claws's Past Life

**Chapter 18**

**Claws's Past Life**

It was the night after Dakota was chased down by the Jasper wolves and killed by Humphrey, using a blade crafted by Nytmen, to avenge the deaths of Kate, Banja, Garth, and many others. It was on that night that Nytmen requested Claws back to her den. He was living in her den with her puppies Dahlia, Kara, Christina, Jordon, Justin, and Scar because no one else had been accepting of a wolf who was half vampire. They didn't want him because it was the vampires who were killing their friends and relatives. Claws had argued about how they'd failed to realize how Nytmen was more like them than he was like the vampires.

The main reason Claws had allowed him to live in her den was she wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for Nytmen. The second reason was why she still allowed him to. It was because she liked him—not just as friend who saved her life but as a mate. That was why she'd allowed him to mate with her. And because he'd mated with her, and eaten her out, they considered themselves to be dating, at the least, now. They wanted to consider themselves mates, but they hadn't gone through with the marriage ceremony yet. No one even knew that they'd mated, that she was pregnant, or that they even loved each other. She respected him for saving his life and was interested in the fact that he was partially a vampire wolf and partially a living wolf. She'd wanted to mate with him so he wouldn't possibly be the last one. And since she was once one as well, in a past life according to the wolf who was basically her mate now, that that anyone else knew that, Claws had figured that their genes would mix perfectly. Lastly, Nytmen had told her that those fluids wouldn't infect her. It was only the blood of a vampire wolf that could infect a living wolf, not their saliva, tears, semen, or so on. It only transferred through the blood of the vampires, or any contact with their fangs and claws, not through any other fluid in the body.

"What did you want to talk about?" Claws asked Nytmen.

"Your past life," he said. "I'm going to tell you everything about your past life—when you were the half vampire wolf called 'Raven.' I feel like, if I tell you more about her than I did, that it can help us stop these vampires…"

* * *

According to Nytmen, Raven—Claws's past life—was born 205 years ago, which was 5 years before she saved the Western Pack that had existed back in the early 1800s from vampires. That was the first recorded encounter with any former of the undead in wolf history in Canada. Nytmen had been in Jasper for longer than anyone thought and he'd learned everything he could about vampires in his time, right down to past encounters with them.

Raven was only a puppy when her parents were killed by the vampires on a hunt for caribou. The vampire wolves hadn't been seen in Jasper before and so the Eastern and Western Pack Wolves had assumed they were just wolves from another pack. Their mistake had resulted in the bloody and brutal deaths of at least thirty wolves, from both packs. There had been no casualties for the vampire wolves. Not even any injured. As the oldest of her litter, she had been responsible for her fellow orphaned siblings. They hadn't wanted to be adopted out and Raven had proven to be extremely intelligent for her young age. She'd kept them all live, without any adults ever helping them, until they reached their adulthood. And she'd also protected them from many dangers that would've killed wolf pups normally, ranging from weasels and stoats, which they'd worked together to kill, to a pissed off mama grizzly bear. They'd played with her cubs and the mother hadn't been happy about it, but they'd somehow managed to escape alive and unharmed by the bear. They never made contact with any bear cub again after that because Raven had told her younger siblings that bears were dangerous. She'd made them believe that they could only trust wolves. Not bears, weasels, stoats, or any other animal, even birds. They'd only use those animals as a food source, excluding the bears, but they wouldn't associate themselves with any animals but wolves.

While Raven never officially married anyone in her life, she had mated with one male wolf during a one-night stand. She'd loved him and had wanted to marry him, but never had the courage to tell him that she'd loved him and wanted to be his mate. Two months later, she'd never have the chance to tell him her true feelings about him. He met his untimely death at the fangs of the vampires, the first attack by a vampire ever recorded by wolves.

That was the first time Raven had ever seen vampire wolves in her life. Neither Raven nor her siblings had seen their parents' murdered because they'd been asleep in another part of the den when their parents had been murdered during their puppy days. While her true love had been killed and then returned to life as a vampire only minutes later, she had been wounded, rather than killed. She'd suffered a bite to the neck when the same vampire had tried to drink her blood. She'd killed the attacker by breaking his neck and then tearing his head off without realizing she'd discovered one of the few ways a vampire could be killed. She'd also killed her true love, now a vampire, in the same fashion, and had buried them in the ground at that spot so no one would desecrate the body of her puppies' father.

After this encounter, Raven had thought her life would be over because of what she'd seen her almost mate turn into. She hadn't wanted to turn into a vampire like he did, so she'd contemplated killing herself for many days, but never did. Raven had spent many days at a cliff side, all alone, ready to jump off at the moment she'd turn into one of those vampires. She hadn't cared that she'd been pregnant—they'd become vampires, too. But that never happened after spending an entire week there. She never turned into a vampire, so she'd returned to her pack a different wolf. She had transformed into something different, but only partially.

Raven was still a living wolf, but she was partially a vampire now. She had to drink the blood of the living to stay alive, but didn't have the ravenous tendencies that the purebred vampires had. She wasn't drawn to drinking the blood of the living, and hated doing it, but she was forced to constantly hunt down small animals to stay alive. She'd drink her fill of blood from their corpses and that was all she needed to stay alive. As a partial vampire, she rarely needed to eat to stay alive, nor did she feel the pains of being hungry like living wolves did. And when she gave birth, it had seemed that her puppies were entirely normal, unlike their mother, until they'd reached their adolescence.

One morning, as their mother had been watching from their den, one of her children had begun acting strange when he went out in the sun. It had begun with him acting as if he was burning, but they couldn't figure out why. Raven hadn't assumed, at the time, that her only son was part vampire like her. She wasn't able to come out during the day, so she'd developed a sleeping pattern where she slept during the day and was awake at night. That had caused her to become the target of many insults such as "bat wolf," "night wolf," "vampire wolf," and so on. But what Raven and her daughters had witnessed that morning, a year ago, had horrified them. Before anyone had been able to do anything to save him, her only son's flesh had begun bubbling, almost boiling as if it were water, until his body had exploded into a mess of blood and gore before many horrified witnesses, including his mother and sisters. The same had never happened to his sisters, but it had told Raven what could really happen to her if she went out in the sun. This event had made her even more determined to only come out at night, just like the vampires.

It was not long after this, on an eerie and foggy night, that everyone had learned there was something evil in Jasper. But not even Raven had assumed it was the vampires because they normally only drank the blood of the living. What had been discovered on this cool fall night showed more signs of being a demon or werewolf attack than a vampire attack. They'd known about the vampires' existence from the day Raven had been bitten, but never would've assumed they were responsible for the slaughter they found.

The Alpha male of the Eastern Wolf Pack had been found dead—no, slaughtered—by the Alpha and Beta wolves who'd been entrusted with keeping himself. His body had been mutilated by something. There was a tree branch stuck in the ground with his severed head impaled on it, the sharp end sticking through. It had been sharpened to a point like a spear. Blood had still been gushing from where his head had been severed. His paws had also been cut off, as had been his entire—_well,_ Raven thought, _that would hurt the males hearing my story if I go into any more detail_—had torn off by the claws of something. And then there was the gash on his body. It wasn't just a normal cut…he had been cut open from his muzzle all the way down to his crotch and all of his internal organs from his chest to his crotch had been taken out and arranged in separate piles based on which bodily system they belonged to. Whoever had done this was smart. Smart…but brutal and beyond sadistic. Raven and the other wolves felt sick as they saw their Alpha male's heart, lungs, liver, stomach, intestines, and so many other internal organs…and at the fact that any killer would take the time to sort them!

"What kinda of heartless brute would do something like this?" one of the present male wolves asked. "I've never seen something like this in all my life…"

"I don't know how we'll break this to his mate," Raven said. "The only good thing is he won't turn into one of them like my poor mate a year ago. Let's bury him and set up a watch so no one else will die…"

...

Two nights later, the watch proved useless with the Eastern Wolf Pack's territory was attacked by many vampires, hell bent on drinking more blood from living wolves. There were so many that wolves were being taken done and bitten by vampires left and right. Not even Raven could prevent all the death and she was a wolf who'd learned to be a vampire hunter. She knew every way to possibly kill them, and had cast a spell that would her soul (that of a vampire hunter) and pass it down from descendant to descendant until it reached a wolf who was a reincarnation of Raven. (She didn't know it, obviously, but that would be Claws.)

After at least fifty wolves had been slaughtered by the vampires, and many turned into vampires, Raven had found the Alpha female of the vampires. She knew what had to be done. She had to kill the Alpha female of the vampires to stop them all. So she shouted something that got the attention of the Alpha female vampire. It was something so vulgar and insulting that she was distracted from drinking the blood of the male wolf now lying at her paws.

Both of them were screaming as they ran for each other. There was an eruption of blood and everything went black for Raven and the Alpha female of the vampire. When everything calmed down, all of the vampires were gone, and two wolves were on the ground. One was dead…

* * *

"What happened next?" Claws asked Nytmen.

"Raven, your past life," Nytmen went on, "had successfully killed the vampires' Alpha female, but her throat had been torn open. She was dead within a matter of two or three minutes. No one had been able to save her from bleeding out."

"So how does this relate to me?" she asked.

"You are the wolf she passed her soul onto," he explained. "Raven was reborn as you, Claws, when you were born. You are the reincarnation of Raven." Claws gave him a blank look that told him she was thoroughly confused. "I'll explain some more. The spirit of Raven reawaked in you some point after Kate was killed by Dakota. Raven's spirit was in you all along, but it was dormant until the vampires started killing in your pack again. That is what changed your behave. If you didn't notice, Claws, you are acting more adult-like than you were before Kate's death. And that is why you allowed me to mate with you, when you had gotten angry because of my advances months earlier."

"So what I am supposed to do?" Claws asked.

"You're the one who must confront the Alpha female of the vampires," Nytmen said, "and kill her. You'll have to kill their queen and lead the vampires to their death to stop them all. And you'll have to do so soon. Very soon…"


	20. To Fear The Night

**Chapter 19**

**To Fear the Night**

Only an hour after Nytmen had revealed to Claws that she was once a wolf called Raven—who once hunted vampire wolves—Claws was sleeping next to Nytmen. Claws was a large wolf, but she was three quarters the size of Nytmen. Her head stopped at his shoulders and Claws's tail only stretched half its length beyond Nytmen's body. His own tail was wrapped around Claws's body and his head was lying on top of Claws's head.

Although Claws was sleeping, Nytmen wasn't. He couldn't sleep because he was worried about Claws, as his mate and possibly the mother of their puppies. And he was worried about what kinda of future they could all be forced to live. If they stopped the vampires, they'd have nothing to worry about. And they would know how to stop the vampires in the future if this happened again. But if they didn't stop the vampires, they would take over Jasper, and Claws and their puppies could die. She'd told him that she was pregnant shortly after he'd told her all about her past life as Raven. Nytmen had already lost one mate and puppies. He couldn't imagine going through that a second time. He loved Claws more than any wolf he'd ever known as a girlfriend or mate. If she died, he'd die with her. And he was sure Claws felt the same way about him. They'd been inseparable from the moment they met and even more so right after he knocked up—a slang expression that meant got someone pregnant—Claws. But Nytmen had also been more worried than ever about her from the moment he'd mated with her and learned she was pregnant. He would be up all night away, being part vampire, but he didn't want to be up all night with such concerns about Claws. He didn't want to be thinking about her so much if it was him being worried about her dying.

Nytmen began talking to himself in a whisper. "Please, Claws," he whispered, licking the top of her head gently with his tongue. "I don't want to lose you…you mean so much to mean…" He was trying to avoid crying. He didn't want to seem sad about her when she was so close to him. "I love you," he whispered, then laid his head back down on top of Claws's head when she started kicking. He feared what would come tomorrow night. He was expecting for something terrible to happen…

* * *

"Ahhh…" Claws let out a moan as she woke up form a short nap the next night. She hadn't been sleeping, yet, but relaxing after a sudden hunt before she and Nytmen went to sleep for the night. He was in their den, at the mouth of it, as he always was.

Claws and Nytmen usually went on short walks every night before she fell asleep. Ever since she'd mated with and unofficially married Nytmen, both of which were events that no one knew about yet, Claws had been closer to Nytmen than she had been before. She was closer to him than any other wolf she'd ever had a relationship with up to now. She wasn't afraid to tell him anything about herself, but there was one thing Claws hadn't told him yet. Scar. She hadn't said anything to Nytmen about her old mate had been murdered by the rogues over a year ago during the last battle between the Jasper and Banff wolves. She was going to today. Claws would always love Scar more than anyone, even Nytmen, she realized, even if she was now pregnant with the puppies of a different wolf.

Nytmen was awake, obviously, as well, and staring at the moon from the mouth of their den.

"Nytmen," he heard Claws say. "There's something I wanted to tell you about me that I haven't yet."

"What is it?" Nytmen asked her.

"You aren't my first mate," she said slowly, "but my second one. A year ago, my mate was a Beta wolf called Scar." Claws started crying just at the mention of her deceased love. "H-he…"

Nytmen ran over to comfort Claws. He wrapped his front legs around her. "Go on," he whispered, urging her on gently.

"He was murdered by the rogue wolves from Banff when they attacked Jasper in full force," she continued in a grieving voice. "I had been injured and unable to do anything. I saw those fuckers tear him apart, limb from limb…oh, it was terrible! I contemplated killing myself after the war was over, even though we had won, because Scar had been murdered. But then I'd learned I was pregnant and that gave me a reason to go on living. I couldn't kill myself if I had new life growing inside me."

"I'm so sorry," Nytmen said. "I lost my mate, too. Only to the vampires, not the rogues from Banff."

Claws sniffed and Nytmen wiped her tears away. "It seems like we have more in common than just being part vampire," she said almost cheerfully. "Thank you, Nytmen…"

"There's something more you want to say, isn't there?" he asked Claws as he let her go.

"Yes, there is," Claws sighed sadly. "I want to take you to where Scar was buried over a year ago."

"What about your six children?" Nytmen asked.

"They're sleeping now," Claws said. "I don't want to wake them. I took them there yesterday, but I want to take you there. You're family and you saved my life."

* * *

Claws and Nytmen, together, slowly approached the patch of dirt where Scar had been buried after his death. Immediately, Claws broke down, and started crying. She couldn't stand be hearing at the grave of the first wolf she'd ever loved and the only one she'd ever married in her life, before Nytmen. It broke her heart know he was dead, even when it was over a year after Scar was murdered.

"I'm sorry, Scar," she whispered. "I wish I'd been able to do something when those rogues attacked you…I failed you. I don't deserve to be your mate…I failed you a year ago. I should've done something to save your life a year ago during that war…maybe you'd be alive now. I'm so sorry…some mate I am! I couldn't even save you from a few wolves…"

Nytmen decided to say nothing as Claws mourned. He knew that when a wolf was blaming herself for her mate's death that it was best not to say anything about how it wasn't her fault. And he was sure it wasn't Claws's fault that Scar was killed by the rogues. Sure, she had gotten wounded by the rogues, but that didn't mean she should be blaming herself for Scar's murder. The only wolves to blame are the heartless sons of bitches who murdered him. But there was no telling the spouse of the murdered wolf that. She wouldn't listen to him. Nytmen was sure.

Claws's ears perked up when she heard a tree branch crack, as did Nytmen's ears. She all but forgot about mourning Scar. "Someone is watching us," Claws whispered. "I think we'd better get out of here."

"It might be too late for that," Nytmen whispered back.

"We can still try-" she began, but a loud, bloodcurdling scream from back where the wolves slept in their dens stopped her. "Shit…" Claws gasped.

"Come on!" Nytmen growled. "They're screaming about the vampires!"

* * *

When Claws and Nytmen returned to the area where most of the dens of the wolves were located, they saw a scene straight out of Hell. There were at least forty vampire wolves all over the clearing and many wolves were already dead, from both halves of the united pack—the Eastern and the Western Pack Wolves. And even one former Northern Pack wolf. It was Airmead, the younger sister of Mica and the second oldest from her litter, and Candu who Claws recognized immediately.

Mica was fighting off the vampires with Princess, Humphrey, Runt, Claudette, Stinky, Fleet, and Magril on all sides of her. They knew not to bite the vampires, so they were just clawing into their undead flesh hoping that something would drive them off. But the vampires felt no pain, so they just kept running at their potential victims. Claudette and Magril were screaming in terror while Mica was screaming in anger and cursing at these vampires. These undead fuckers who left her and all her siblings orphaned! These undead who just killed her sister Airmead who was the reason she'd left the Southern Wolf Pack as an adolescent. Airmead had convinced Mica to leave the pack and go to the Western Wolf Pack to marry Stinky, whom she truly loved, rather than Clint. And now she was dead! Although the eight wolves were constantly drawing the blood of any vampire wolf who came near them, their attacks did nothing to drive them off permanently. It was as if they were toying with them before they tried to drink their blood. But Mica would be damned if she met the same fate as her parents and sister!

"STINKY!" Mica heard Claudette scream her mate's name. She turned her head from the vampire whose eyes she'd just gouged out to see Stinky being dragged away by several vampires. He was screaming for someone to help him.

"Princess!" Mica wailed. "Come on!"

Princess and Mica took off after the two vampire wolves who were dragging Stinky toward the darkness of the forest. There would be no hope for Stinky if they drug him into there. But what took place next sealed Stinky's fate.

"No!" Mica screamed when she saw one of the vampires jump on Stinky's back and bury her fangs into the flesh near his jugular vein. He screamed in agony as Princess forcibly dragged Mica way, saying there was nothing that could be done for him now. Mica didn't want to hear that shit and tried to break away so she could at least save Stinky from having his blood drank. The last time she saw his face was when Stinky mouthed "I love you, Mica" before he was dragged into the bushes. She heard flesh tearing and bones break, then screams, and nothing but silence followed from the forest.

"NO!" Mica roared. "I'll fucking kill you all! Let go of me, Princess. Damn it, Princess, let go!"

"He's dead!" Princess barked and slapped some sense into Mica. Literally. She slapped Mica across the side of her head with her massive paw. "You can't save him! If you want to die, too, BE MY FUCKING GUEST! I won't save you if you go after him when you know better and when you know he's dead!"

"You're right," Mica wailed. "I just can't accept that he's gone…not after everything we've been through together. Let's send them to Hell where they belong," she added with a growl that was almost evil.

* * *

Claws and Nytmen had joined the fight not with Mica and the others but with Melissa, Gemma, Candy, and many of the siblings of Mica, who were fighting because they'd seen what happened to Stinky and Airmead. Gemma was an Omega runt wolf who'd been adopted by Reba and Janice—the Omega vegetarians—because her parents had died when she was young, and no one had wanted to adopt a runt.

"Stinky, Airmead, and Candu didn't mate it!" Melissa screeched. "What do we do?!"

"You have to take their heads off!" Nytmen instructed. "Or severely damage their hearts! Nothing else will kill them."

"If we can hold them off for ten more minutes," Claws said, "the sun will rise and they'll regret coming here!"

"Why?!" Katria, the third oldest of the eighteen wolves born to Mica's parents, screamed as she crushed the skull of a vampire under her weight. She'd been a lightweight wolf like Lilly when she was younger, but she was more like Candy and Mooch now that she was an adult. She was overweight but that didn't mean she couldn't fight like the other Betas in the united pack she now lived on. She'd just fell on the head of a stunned vampire and that had crushed his skull like an egg.

"The vampires can't come out during the day," Nytmen said. "If they do, the sun will turn them to stone, and then they'll collapse into ashes. That is the best way to kill this many!"

"Claws!" Nyra, the seventh oldest of Mica's litter, Mica included, screamed suddenly. "Behind you!"

"It's Queen!" Melissa screamed.

"And I am the Queen!" she roared. "In name and literally! I am the female leader of these vampires and I need some fucking blood! Your brother in law," she said to Mica's siblings, "didn't satisfy me! His blood tasted great, but I need more Alpha blood! My daughter will be a good start!"

"You fight me," Claws roared, "if you want to get to Princess!" She wouldn't let any of these vampires hurt Princess, whom she had a sisterly relationship with. "You'll have to get through this Beta wolf before you get anymore Alpha blood, you fucking vampire whore!"

"'Vampire whore'?!" Queen repeated in a demonic voice. "You will die for that!"

"Claws!" Nytmen shouted. "Take this!" And he tossed the same blade that Humphrey had used to almost mutilate Dakota in her direction. She caught it just as Queen lunged at her. There was a sound of fleshing being stabbed, but no bones cracking.

"Fuck," Claws growled. The blade hadn't gone into Queen's heart but into her stomach. That did nothing to hurt Queen because her stomach wasn't a vital organ to vampires. Queen was up in an instant and tossed Claws into a tree. She was still holding the blade, but she was in a daze, as she lay there bleeding from a small gash on the back of the head. She'd been knocked senseless by the impact of her skull crashing into the tree. It was an oak and those had strong wood. Strong enough to cause a mild concussion.

A concussion was the least of Claws's worries as she barely realized what was going on. Queen was running toward her from the spot she'd thrown Claws from. That was several meters away!

"No!" Nytmen screamed. He began running, too, when he saw Queen extend her massive vampire fangs. He wasn't going to let Claws die now. Time seemed to slow down on the battlefield as all the living wolves and all the vampire wolves watched this unfold. The fighting had stopped when the vampires had heard Claws challenge their Alpha female to a duel. They'd all agreed to stop the fighting to see what would happen, all wolves knowing that if the vampire queen died that they would be under the control of whoever killed her.

"Claws!" Nytmen yelled, trying almost in vain to get her attention. "Get down!"

Nytmen and Queen arrived at the tree at the same moment. He snatched the blade from Claws's motionless paw then there was a splatter of blood all over her face that brought Claws out of her stunned state. Queen was bleeding from a slash to the throat, but what Claws saw next horrified her more than anything she'd seen yet. It made that day she'd almost been killed by a vampire, and saved by Nytmen, seem like nothing. Queen was still alive and had more strength than Nytmen, who was in a chokehold. He was unable to fight back as Queen stabbed his own blade into his chest.

"Nytmen!" Claws screamed. "No!"

Nytmen coughed. "S-stay back," he groaned. "I-I saved you …you're a-all that I care about…"

"You will die for saving your bitch!" Queen roared and sank her fangs into Nytmen's jugular vein. She drank her fill of blood, and then looked up in horror at the sky. _Oh no,_ she thought. The sun was almost up in the sky.

"Retreat!" Queen ordered her small legion of vampires. She'd lost ten troops and they'd only taken three lives—Stinky, Airmead, and Candu. But there would be a fourth—Nytmen.

The vampires were back into the abandoned cave, that no one had known they were living in before now, in an instant. The battlefield was clear of vampires, except for the ten dead ones.

Claws as in tears as she held Nytmen in her front legs. He was dying, she knew it, and he knew it. Everyone on the former battlefield knew it. There was nothing that could be done for Nytmen. His blade was buried deep in his heart and Queen had punctured his jugular vein. Those were both fatal injuries that not even Eve—Kate and Lilly's mother—could do anything to heal. He wasn't going to survive. Claws was heartbroken for a second time in her life. The first had been when she saw Scar torn to pieces by the rogues. Now, she was losing another mate whose puppies she was carrying.

"Oh, Nytmen," Claws wailed. "Why did you have to do that?"

"I-I," Nytmen groaned. He was gurgling as blood gushed from the wound in his chest and on his throat. He was coughing up blood. "I couldn't let you die…you know why, Claws." His voice was getting weaker. "You n-need to live another day so you can kill the vampires' queen…remember what I told you about how you can stay unnoticed around the vampires."

Claws remembered what he'd said to her days ago when they'd spoken to Reba and Janice about garlic and onions. "Garlic keeps vampires away," Nytmen had told them. "But if you cover yourself in vampire blood and onion juice, it can keep vampire from biting you and if you need to hide somewhere, they can't smell your blood or track you. Onions have the same effect on vampires as garlic but it is a weaker effect. It won't drive the vampires away but it will make you 'invisible.' Think of it as a camouflage, Claws."

"Yes, I remember," Claws cried. She was hugging Nytmen as his life slipped away, as the sun rose. She knew what would happen to him, being a half vampire, when the sun's rays hit his body. They were out in the wide-open clearing between the dens, with other crying wolves around them. Melissa was consoling Candu's widow, knowing exactly how she felt. Melissa was also a widow because of the vampires, having lost Hutch. And, again, Scarlet was comforting Mica over the death of her mate Stinky and her sister Airmead, as her aunt mourned Nytmen. "I'll go after Queen immediately…your death won't be in vain…"

"It already won't be," Nytmen groaned in a weaker voice yet. "I…saved…your life…you mean…" He coughed and spit up blood. "…the world to me and I gave…it all away for you…to live…" He started gasping and wheezing. "I love you…"

"I love you, too…" Claws whispered sadly, as Nytmen died in her arms. She buried her muzzle in his chest, after pulling his knife out of his flesh, as the sun raised high in the sky. She felt warmth of its ray on her fur coat. While it didn't affect her at it, she felt Nytmen's body grow harder in an instant. She opened her eyes to see that Nytmen had turned to stone because of the sun's rays, just as he'd said would happen to any vampire who was exposed to them. That included Nytmen, even though he was only half a vampire, not a full-blown vampire.

Claws thought it was over as she kissed his dead, stone-like muzzle with grief. The wolf who'd saved her life twice was dead and she couldn't bear to think about it. Not to mention how Mica had just been told they found Stinky's headless body impaled on a tree sapling which all the branches had been broken off of. Queen had left a note that read:

_I just thought I'd leave you fuckers a gift. Considering you'll all be dead soon enough, all your fucking throats will be ripped out, just like Kate's was. Nothing can save you, or will save you. WE RULE THE NIGHT! Remember that. You can be a pussy and hide in your caves but, when nighttime comes then it's our turn…no mercy._

Claws shed massive tears as Nytmen's body began falling apart in her arms. He was nothing but ashes in a matter of seconds. Claws, screaming hysterically, had buried her face in those ashes, wishing there was something that could be done to bring Nytmen and the others back.

She had been left heartbroken for a second time, just as Mica was again. Mica had been heartbroken when her now dead father had tried to force her to marry someone other than Stinky, but they'd gotten married because she ran away from him, but now he was dead! Claws had been heartbroken, first, when Scar died, and now when Nytmen died in her arms. It was a new day with a hellish start but she would take that hellishness straight to Queen and those other vampires—_Those motherfuckers_, Claws thought bitterly—immediately.

They would regret ever attacking her pack!


	21. She Must Die!

**Chapter 20**

**She Must Die!**

Claws was with Reba and Janice, the vegetarians, and Gemma, their daughter by adoption, who was the mate of Sam, the youngest pup of Princess and Runt. They'd found enough onions to mask all of Claws's scent for her next, and hopefully, last mission involving these vampire wolves. Nytmen had told her that, while garlic would scare vampires off, onions would mask her scent if she were covered in enough onion juice. Well, she was sure she been covered in enough to keep her safe long enough to kill Queen, the Alpha female of the vampires. And then get to the vampires to go into the sunlight and be destroyed like her poor Nytmen had been early this morning.

The vampires wouldn't come out of their 'lair' now, so it was the best chance Claws had to stop them. The others would be safe from the vampires because they wouldn't be able to rebel due to Claws being here. If she succeeded in killing Queen, the vampires would listen to Claws, and she would order them to follow her into the sun. They wouldn't argue with their 'new queen,' as insane of an order it would seem for them to be given. They'd always listen to their queen or the wolf who defeated her, if there ever was one who managed to do that. Claws didn't just have onions as one of her weapons against the vampires, but also the knife that Nytmen had crafted for the purpose of killing vampires. The vegetarians had crafted a strap from powerful vines large enough to go around Claws's body. It had several slot-like pouches in it, which held not only Nytmen's blade but also some cloves of garlic, three wooden stakes, and a bottle of liquefied onions. There was also a bottle of liquefied garlic. Reba and Janice had found the bottles in one of the many trashcans throughout their pack's territory in Jasper. They were probably beer bottles but that didn't matter any.

"Reba, Janice…" Claws said, "…if I don't come back, I want you two, and Gemma, to act as parent figures for my children. Sure, they are adults, but they've always had the option of coming to me if they have any problems. If I die, they won't have that option, so I am entrusting you two to having that role. You are smart wolves. I'm sure you'll figure out a solution for them." She paused. "Lastly, I'm sorry for how poorly I used to treat you. If I don't make it back, I want you both to know that I deeply regret ever treating you how I had, and that I wish I could make it up entirely somehow. If I die, I'll live in peace that you know both know how much I regret being cruel to you. I'm a different wolf now and not just because of these vampires, but because I have matured since then. I was immature and stupid then. If I don't come back, this is goodbye to you and everyone. And I want you to tell my six children, their mates, and any grand children I have that I love them all so much. Let them know that I went after the vampire queen. If I don't come back, you'll all know what happened and should prepare for a worse attack to be carried out by the vampires. If I do return, that makes it's all over." Claws paused again. "She—the vampire queen—must die this morning. She'll be weak because she bit Nytmen, who is part vampire."

"How so?" Reba asked.

"If a vampire bites another vampire, a pure bred like Queen or a hybrid like Nytmen, he or she will get extremely sick," Claws said. "I must kill Queen while she is weak. This is the best time to go after her. Just do what I say and tell them where I went and everything else I said. I'll try to come back alive, but I won't make any promises."

* * *

Claws went as far as the Eastern Wolf Pack's former territory because the vampires hadn't been in the den they'd fled to after Queen had fatally wounded Nytmen. She'd seen the reason why immediate. It was because they'd hidden a tunnel at the back of the den underneath a blanket of moss. That was how they had gotten into that den unnoticed and how they'd left it during the day.

Claws had traveled through that tunnel alone until she'd ended up inside her former den where she'd lived with Scar before her entire back had either gone rogue or moved to the Western Wolf Pack's Territory. She hadn't known until this moment that there was a tunnel leading from her den in the East to another den in the West. It would explain why the vampires had managed to get from place to place unnoticed and so quickly, too. Claws, as she walked out of her old den, was thinking about how she could possibly succeed at killing Queen, even if she was sick after drinking Nytmen's blood. She could still be more powerful than any living wolf, even one like Claws who was once part vampire just like Nytmen. She really hoped she could live up to repeating the actions she'd done as Raven during her past life 200 years ago.

Claws was also thinking about how, if Nytmen was killed by Queen so easily, she could be killed much easier. Nytmen had been a stronger wolf than she was now. She might be stronger than Nytmen had been mentally, but he had been stronger than her physically. And he'd been tossed around like a fucking ragdoll! She would be torn to fucking pieces and eating like strips of fucking raw bacon! She didn't want that to happen, but as long as she killed all the vampires before dying, if she did die, then everything would be worth it in her mind.

But she'd never die or kill the vampires if she didn't find the lair where the vampires were all living. She hadn't thought to force Dakota to tell them where their lair was before he'd been killed by Humphrey. She wished she'd kept him alive long enough to learn that much, at least. It would make her task so much easier, since she only had about twelve hours to find it. She doubted it would take that long. No, she hoped it wouldn't take that long because, if nightfall came, all hell would break loose again, just as it had last night at dusk. She couldn't allow the vampires to live another day to kill anyone else. Sure, they'd only killed four wolves—Nytmen, Stinky, Airmead, and Candu—last night but that was four wolves too many. She'd rather no one put those ten vampires had died last night. Mica had still been heartbroken a few hours after the vampires had left because Stinky and Airmead, whom she was closest to out of all her siblings, had been killed. No one had expected that Nytmen or Stinky would've been killed. Especially Nytmen, since he was a hunter of vampires since his early adolescent years and had survived this long. Then again, he had thrown himself into the fray involving Claws and Queen with the intention of saving Claws no matter what the cost would've been. And it cost him his life, but saved Claws's. And, at the same time, because Queen had drunk some of Nytmen's blood, his death did more than just save Claws's life. It also meant that Queen had probably fallen ill because of Nytmen's blood being in her body—because he was half a vampire wolf and half a living wolf. If a vampire drank the blood of a vampire, he or she would get very sick—throwing up, weaker, needing to drink more blood of the living, and so on.

But Claws would tear her goddamn head off and put Nytmen's knife in her fucking heart, if that bitch Queen even had such an organ! She had no emotions and had felt nothing but joy when she and the other vampires had been attack Claws's pack. So many wolves had died in addition to Nytmen, Stinky, Airmead, and Candu, but she didn't have a chance to stick around to see who else had died. But they had looked like all Eastern Pack Wolves and no one else from the Western Pack or formerly of the Northern Pack. Airmead was the only former Northern Pack Wolf who had been killed last night.

Claws and Nytmen hadn't witnessed the deaths of Airmead and Candu, but Princess had told Claws that she'd been bathing in the river within view of the pack when they'd heard a scream. They'd looked to see her getting attacked by several vampire wolves. It was King who had drunk her blood before ordering them to tear her to pieces—literally. They'd torn her from limb-from-limb, tore off her head, and stripped her body of all flesh and pulled out every organ in her body. Candu had met the same fate when he'd tried to save Airmead before they'd even bitten her.

Ten minutes later, Claws found a large cave that reeked with the scent of vampire wolves, corpses of once living wolves, and blood, of course. The scent of death and blood was so strong that it made Claws almost want to become a vegetarian. She'd never smelt this much blood in her life, not even when she was on caribou hunts. It was an unbearable scent that was driving Claws crazy. It made her want to tear her nose off just so she didn't need to smell it anymore. It made her not want to go into that den not because of the vampires but because of the unbearable stench. But the reality was that the stench of blood and death would be the least of her worries even if she were coated in onion juice. That was only part of the solution, she now realized. The other was she'd need to be entirely "invisible" was covered in head-to-paw in the blood of a vampire. Nytmen had told her, but she'd been so upset after his death that she'd only remembered the part regarding onion juice. It would make her "invisible" because she would smell just like the vampires, themselves, and they would just pass by her as if she weren't there. They'd think she was just another vampire, according to Nytmen. But the onion juice would still make her "invisible" to them, but she wouldn't appear as a vampire to them.

And since it wasn't an extract of garlic, they wouldn't be afraid to attack her and tear her apart like they had Airmead. And her blood would be drunk just like what had happened to Nytmen, Kate, Griffin, Banja, Stinky, and many others.

Claws tried to put all her fear aside as she approached the mouth of the vampires' lair, den—whatever the fuck it was called! Still, the truth was that she was scared shitless. She'd probably shit herself, Claws thought, if she ran face-to-face with a vampire. And then she would be fucked—figuratively speaking. If that happened, her waste wouldn't be masked by the garlic and it would give her away to those vampires. She was slowly walking through the tunnel that led into a larger and seemingly empty cave. It was bright because of the sunlight, so obviously Claws would have to go deeper into the cave. Maybe even so deep into her that it would be pitch black. But that wouldn't be a problem for Claws, since she was a wolf. Wolves could see in the dark with no trouble. But the vampires would still have an advantage over her. Where she could see well in the dark, the vampire wolves could see in the dark so much better than any living wolf could ever home to. Even better than a former half vampire wolf such as Claws.

She was only half a vampire in mentality because she knew her goal—to kill Queen and lead all the other vampires into the sun where they would be destroyed just like poor Nytmen had. She would avenge his death and the deaths of everyone else, even if nothing would truly make the relatives of the deceased happy again. Nothing could bring Stinky or anyone else back to how they were before their deaths. They were gone and nothing could change that now. But the victims could rest in peace if the vampires were all destroyed.

"Fuck," Claws whispered in a gasp when she heard footsteps coming from a dark corner of the cave. It looked like a tunnel that went into a deeper part of the cave. She dashed over there silently and listened.

"You know where the queen's den is!" a male vampire snapped at another.

"Where?" Claws assumed that it was a newly turned vampire who asked this. "You know I just became a vampire!"

"Fine," the other male growled. "You go down that tunnel, turn to the right, follow it to the dead end, then turn to the left, and follow that tunnel until you find a massive chamber followed with blood…"

"Is that her den?"

"Fuck no," he snapped again. "You'll find a hole at the back of the cave. Go through that and follow the tunnel until you find another chamber that would be pitch black for anything but nocturnal animals. That is her den. You may see a few severed wolf heads lying around. Now get going and don't bother her for long. She doesn't like when anyone comes to her unless it's her mate wanting to fuck her or if she's in a mood to suck him off. As you know, she is very busy with planning how we can conquer the living wolves. She doesn't want _anyone_ to distract her from her planning. She's a smart wolf, but she doesn't like to be distracted when she's thinking."

Claws heard the 'new' vampire in the direction away from her while the other one came in her direction! She froze like a statue as he looked out of the opening. He sniffed but only smelled onions, so he growled with disgust, and went back into the darkness. Claws listened to his footsteps until she couldn't hear them anymore. She took advantage of them both being gone and went down the only tunnel she saw in this relatively dark chamber. It was a short tunnel and it didn't take long for Claws to reach the dead end.

Before locating the only tunnel that went to the left, Claws hoped that it wouldn't prove to be a dead end of a different kind for her. For that reason, she dashed through the left tunnel. As she carefully walked through that tunnel, the scent of blood began getting stronger as she went deeper into the vampires' lair. Claws almost screamed in pain when she stubbed her paw on a rock, but she suppressed the urge until the feeling went away entirely. She went on, shaking like a fucking leaf, until she saw the pool of blood. It was more than just a pool. The entire chamber, probably ten feet in every direction, was flooded with blood at least two feet up. Claws was shocked to see this. It made her realize how many victims the vampires truly had claimed. And there was no other way to the hole at the back of the cave, which she could see, other than to wade through the blood until she was at the hole that was on a ledge.

Trying not to go, Claws stepped into the blood and began walking through it, even though it splashed. She felt more and more like puking her last meal up as she went further across the blood pool. She also had a bad feeling that kept getting worse as she got closer to the hole that led to the den of the vampires' Alpha female Queen. She could smell her done there. But what happened next was entirely expected. And it scared the shit out of Claws—figuratively speaking. But she did feel something wet running down her leg as she involuntarily urinated in the blood.

Queen had come out of the darkness from a direction that was diagonal and behind Claws at the same time. Claws screamed in terror and immediately picked up the knife that had fallen out of the pouch it was out when Claws had spun around screaming. She was standing on three legs as she slashed at Queen. The blood only struck her throat, and not severely, so Claws's attacks had very little effect on Queen. She hardly felt the five times the blade had cut into her undead flesh.

Queen began laughing evilly and that scared Claws even more. It was so evil of a laugh, with no words, that Claws turned and ran for her life. She yelped when she ran across a patch of ground under the blood, which was splashing all over her body as she ran, collapsed when she ran across it. There was a yelp from Claws and a rumbling sound as the ground collapsed beneath her shaking paws. Queen heard a splash and looked down into the whole.

Queen had known that there was another pool of blood like this one underneath the area, but she'd never known that the ground here was that weak in some spots. The blood that she drank from was pouring down into the chamber below, and she was shocked, almost horrified. She would have to move her den somewhere else now because this area was now ruined!

She looked down there and saw the motionless body of Claws. She laughed and went back to her den, feeling accomplished that she'd managed to possibly kill Claws. No normal wolf could survival such a fall. It was impossible.

Down in another pool of blood, up to just below her ears, Claws wasn't moving at. She seemed lifeless, even though her eyes never moved. Her nose didn't twitch, nor did her tail. She seemed to be dead, from the point of view of the other vampires who were going about their business like nothing had happened. But they knew Queen wasn't happy because her blood supply was gone now. But this dead wolf would be the start of her new supply after they sliced all of Claws's veins open and drained her blood out entirely. They'd take it where Queen chose to have her new den set up and they would eat her body in an act of cannibalism. And it would all be so much easier for them to do. A dead wolf, when it was someone like Claws, was much easier for them to drain out, than consume every bit of flesh and internal organ of than it would be for a living wolf.

In only a matter of minutes, they would be draining her blood into their stone 'buckets' then the rest would tear all her flesh off her body and all her organs out so they would have a good meal for this morning!


	22. Lead Them or Kill Them

**Chapter 21**

**Lead Them or Kill Them**

Claws blinked but didn't move. She wouldn't even breathe. She remained completely still as she heard a few vampire wolves moving about in the pool—no, the lake—of blood she was in. The blood she was in was so deep that she was halfway submerged in it. Any deeper and she would've been able to taste it. She felt sick just being this deep in blood as it flowed around her body like some sort of thicker water. She could feel it moving through the furs on her tail and underneath it. It took all the mental strength she had left to avoid twitching or yelping because of how much the flowing blood was 'tickling' her. If she made any noise or moved any, she would be torn to pieces immediately. The vampires wouldn't give her a chance.

How the fuck was she gonna get out of this? That was what Claws was wondering as she lay half submerged in blood that could possibly belong to wolves she'd once known. There was so much of it that she'd never know. But she was sure there was blood here from wolves from all four of the wolf packs—northern, southern, eastern, and western. She'd never seen this much blade in her life and hoped she would never again. As she'd thought earlier, it made her want to become a vegetarian if she lived through this. She would slowly wean herself off meat until she didn't need to eat it anymore. If she suddenly stopped eating all meat, it would be an extreme shock to her body and could kill her. But it wouldn't matter if she got killed here in this cave. She'd never have the chance to become a vegetarian if that happened!

Claws knew that the knife Nytmen had used, and had been killed by, too, wasn't that far away from her. She could feel it underneath her paw, which hurt like the rest of her body. That fall hadn't killed her or broken any bones, but it sure had bruised her body up and left her very sore. It took a lot of effort for her to not groan in pain when the vampires were in the same chamber as she was. Claws had no idea how she'd survived that fall, but something odd had happened as she'd fallen. She'd felt a cool breeze around her body and could've sworn she heard a female voice say, "Don't fight me. I'm here to help. Just let me control you…it is I—Raven, your past life. I am with you now, as I always have been from the moment Kate was killed. You will not die if you follow my instructions. You and I are one."

That voice, that of Raven, her past life, had given Claws all the hope she needed to find Queen again and fight her without the fear she'd had originally. She had been afraid of Queen during their first encounter because of how evilly she'd laughed, but if she ever saw that bitch again, Claws would have no fear. Not one ounce of fear to be shown. She would find Queen not as Claws but as Raven, her past life from 200 years ago who had died fighting the vampire queen of the time. Of course, any wolf in their right mind wouldn't be afraid of what Claws was doing now. She was scared to death and hoped that the death part of that wouldn't be so literal! She hoped the only other death would be that of Queen and all the other vampires in this cave.

"It's time to drink her blood!" Claws heard a male vampire shout. It was Griffin, the father of Mica who was killed before Banja's eyes. Banja had been Mica's mother before she was killed by the vampires who'd drank her dry of blood. Her skull had been crushed by Kate.

"And tear her to pieces!" another shouted. This time, a female.

"Tear her unborn puppies out from that fuckwad Nytmen!" a second female roared. "She won't ever be a whore or a mother again!"

"Tear her fuckin' head off and eat her brains!" a second male vampire wolf shouted. It was Garth.

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" a third female roared. All of the vampires in the cave spun around with looks that were almost of terror on their faces. "None of you fools will do anything to her corpse. Get the fuck out of here and I'll take care of her." It was Queen, Claws realized now. And she knew she was fucked. She might be fucked but she wasn't dead. Claws had no fear now because she could feel her past life taking control of her. She felt as if she were a vampire hunter once again, for real, and now just acting as one like she had been up to now. She was going to kill Queen and it would be much easier because she'd ordered every vampire out of this blood-flooded cave. There wasn't anyone here but Claws and Queen. It had to end here, she thought. She couldn't allow any of these vampires to live another day. It would be the end of everyone and everything she'd ever known if Queen lived another day. Claws had to kill her now and become the so-called 'queen' of the vampires and lead them all into the sun where they would be destroyed by its rays.

_I'll be shutting you the fuck up you fucking whorish vampire BITCH!_ Claws thought angrily. _You won't be talkin' when I'm done with you. Just step over me and your world will come to an end, not the world of us living wolves._

Queen was laughing evilly as she walked over to Claws. She was mocking Claws about having gotten killed so easily and by her own stupidity, in Queen's words. "Well, you came to kill me and you caused your own death, you stupid female," Queen said. "Your pack will be slaughtered like your fuck buddy—excuse me, did that make you mad? Well, your mate!" she added in an insulting way even though she thought Claws was dead as the pieces of bodies floating in this small lake of blood. "And like those three fools who thought they could fight and like so many others before them! Your mutilated body will be left as a warning for them just like my followers left Stinky's body as a warning with my note!"

_Oh, fuck you!_ Claws thought. This vampire bitch was starting to piss her off! Killing those close to her was bad enough! Now here she was insulting the dead! She could burn in Hell once Claws was done with her!

_She'd be the one mutilated, not me!_ Claws thought. She was anxiously grasping Nytmen's knife by the handle, ready to slash her fucking head off at any moment. She had to wait until Queen was over her and in the right position—before she would have a chance to bite Claws on the neck—and then she would make her final attack. She hoped it would be her final attack against these vampires.

When she was dead and gone—hopefully from old age and not the vampires—Claws wouldn't care what happened next regarding the vampires because she wouldn't be around for it. Or would she? Raven had died 200 years ago, killed by the vampire queen of that time, who had died with her, but she'd been reincarnated into another life. Raven was now Claws, who had found her true self in this moment as she laid here in this blood. She was entirely covered in blood because she'd been underneath the blood from the cave above here when the floor had collapsed. She'd landed in this pool of blood and the blood from above had splashed all over her orange body, staining it red. But she looked browner due to the blood having since dried. She'd been down here at least half an hour, maybe more, maybe less. Claws didn't know. And she didn't give a fuck either. She just wanted to kill the vampire queen who was standing over her. Just a few more inches forward and Claws would have the perfect change to strike, to take her head off and end this all—hopefully forever. She hoped there would be no more vampires in Jasper Park, even a thousand years after she was dead and gone. But she probably would be reincarnated into another wolf, maybe even an animal of another species, just as Raven had reincarnated into Claws.

_Now, Claws, now_, she heard a voice in her head. It was Raven again. _Strike now or you'll never have a chance. She's about to strike you._

"NO!" Claws roared, much to the horror of Queen who had no protection now. She'd ordered the vampires to block the entranced off with a large stone and they'd done just that. They hadn't heard Claws's roar "NO!" nor would they hear, see or smell what happened next.

She was gripping her blade tighter than ever before with a new braveness in her, that of Raven, that of a true vampire hunter and of a half vampire wolf like Nytmen had been, and like Claws had been during her past life. And she swung the blade at Queen's neck before the Alpha female of the vampires could react. They both heard the sound of flesh slicing as Claws swung the knife at Queen's throat and as Queen swung her claws toward the wolf of the same name. Blood sprayed, leaving patches of red all over Claws dry bloodstained body. It wasn't Claws's blood but that of Queen. She'd slashed the vampires'' Alpha female so deep into the throat that she could see the bone at the other side. The blade had cut through Queen's esophagus and windpipe. Blood was gushing out of her neck like a fountain. There was so much of it but Claws ignored its existence. She stood up now. She was less afraid in this moment than she ever had been the entire time she'd been in the vampires' lair up to now. She didn't feel like her real self as she raised the blade again and swung it one last time.

There was a *crack* as the blade impacted with Queen's spinal column, breaking the bone and severing her head. There was one thud as her head landed on the ground and a second when her body followed. Claws wasn't done. She took the blade and thrust it into Queen's chest so hard that it busted upon impact. But it got the intended job done, too. The busted blade was buried deep in the heart of Queen. Claws wanted to be sure this bitch was dead and that did it for sure, if severing Queen's head hadn't. But now she had to get out of here. If she were going to die, she would not die in the night but in the light of the sun. Being in this big cave—this vampire lair—was like being in a permanent night and Claws wouldn't die here, if it came to that. She would die where she could see the real world now. She wanted to see the world she had just saved before her death, if she was going to die. She would die a happy wolf, even if she were pregnant, because she'd destroyed the vampires' Alpha female and they had no one to lead them now but Claws. She was unofficially the queen of the vampires now that she'd killed the real one. Even King, or whoever the Alpha male of these fucking bloodsuckers was, would listen to her now. The Alpha female was the leader of vampire 'packs' rather than the Alpha male, as was the case in packs of normal wolves. But during mating season, the Alpha female took over and was in charge of even the Alpha male.

Claws reeked of the order of blood of living wolves and she no longer smelled like the onion juice that had masked her scent until when she'd fallen through the hole in the chamber above here. She smelled more like a living wolf than she ever had. Claws would be torn to pieces by the vampires just outside this chamber if she went that way. She couldn't go that way unless she wanted to die.

"There has to be another way out of here," she whispered to herself in a desperate voice. "I can't die here. Not now. I must get back to the Western Territory…to tell the others." Claws now realized that she was bleeding from a gash on her ribs. Thankfully, it wasn't because of any of the vampires. She'd cut herself when she'd landed on the broken glass from her bottles of onion and garlic juice that had been strapped to her body.

Then she saw it. There was another tunnel at the back of this cave. She realized it was the same one she'd taken to the chamber of the vampire queen. And in that chamber, Claws had seen another tunnel with light shining out of it. That had to be a way to the surface. As Claws went through that tunnel for a second time, she heard voices from the chamber she'd just left—in the nick of time, it seemed. It wasn't the voice of Raven guiding her but the vampires shouting about how their queen was dead. Claws knew she'd left a trail of blood and they were shouting about following it. She took off in a dead run when she heard the running pawsteps of the vampire wolves entering the tunnel she was in!

_Shit!_ Claws thought. They'd found her! She was done for now and not even Raven possessing her body again could save her now. She could only hope that Queen's followers would realize that Claws had killed their queen. Not just some normal intruder or a slave, and would listen to her. Nytmen had told Claws that they would follow any command of whoever killed their Alpha female. And that was her, so Claws hoped he was right and hadn't been speculating about such a thing because her life depended on Nytmen's words now!

Claws made it to the former chamber of the vampire Alpha female but wasn't safe yet. She could hear the voices of the other vampires, her followers, getting closet yet. She darted for the tunnel with the light source coming out of it, jumping over the hole in the chamber floor this time, and screamed with pure terror as she ran for the light. She was so close to the light, so close to being safe!

"You won't get away, you murderer!" she heard a male voice roar. It was King. "You murdered our queen and now we'll tear you to pieces! I've brought every vampire in Jasper with me and you won't get away!"

Claws didn't say anything but kept on running until she found herself on top of a rock formation. She ran out to the edge of the rock outcropping so she was fully exposed to the sunlight but she didn't turn to stone and ashes like Nytmen had. She wasn't even part vampire like he had been. At least not in this life, but as her past life Raven she had been. And it was Raven who was thinking and acting now, not Claws. Claws was gone mentally, completely taken over by Raven. She wasn't afraid of anyone as she stared into the darkness of the tunnel flooding with the army of vampires. An army of the dead—an army of the _undead_.

And that army of vampires stopped dead in their tracks when they saw how Claws had gone into the sunlight.

"What?!" Claws shouted at them. "Are you vampires too pussyfoot to come and get me just because I'm in the sun?! You chased me all this way because I killed your queen and now you don't want to finish me off?!"

"You killed her," King said, "and now you are our leader, but we aren't going to follow the orders of the enemy!"

Claws changed again. She was still physically Claws but everything else about her became Raven once again. "You will listen to me!" Raven spoke through Claws's body. "Or will come in there and decapitate every one of you just like I did your queen 200 years ago, not that any of you were around then! Are you all really going to go against the customs of the vampires and kill your new queen only because she killed the old one? What kind of vampires are you, to not follow your ancient customs? You know what they are. I killed Queen and so now I am your Alpha female."

The army of vampires was stunned. King changed his tone. "Yes," he said. "What do you want us to do?"

"I want you to all destroy yourselves," Raven spoke again. "I want every one of you to step out into the sun and let it turn you to stone. I'll take care of the rest. This word is not a place for vampires—you must all be destroyed." Then she added this lie, "And I will destroy myself once all of you are gone. There cannot be any remnants of our existence."

And then Raven let go of the control she had over Claws's body. Claws was her normal self again. As the vampires came out of the darkness of the tunnel, she grasped her blade and turned to look out toward the horizon. She wanted to stare at the sun again as if it would be the last time she did. Claws heard the vampire wolves screaming a chorus of agony as they were burned up into statue-like replicas of themselves that quickly collapsed into piles of ash.

It was all so remarkable for Claws to see this happening all so quickly. The remaining vampires arrive had after she killed their queen and they'd stood in the way of Claws survival—her covered in blood all over. The vampires, who hadn't yet burned up entirely, even though they were experiencing excruciating pain, stepped to the side and let her pass. They weren't attacking her at all primarily because they knew Claws was the new queen, whether they liked it or not.

Claws walked backed to cliff edge one last time as sun rose higher in the sky. She sighed in relief and peace. It was all over…

* * *

**Author's note:** I would like to thank dawn walker wolf for letting me use his character Nytmen in this story (because he requested that I use one of his OCs in this story as a vampire/living wolf hybrid). A friend told me that is a reference to the movies Blade. I've seen the second one, but I had no idea that any characters were half vampire/half human until after I was told this. That wouldn't have stopped me from using the idea though, if I had known before now, since this is just a fanfiction.

Dawn walker wolf (and a friend who wishes to remain anonymous) both helped suggest ideas that, without them, helped me finish this story. Otherwise, I probably would've canceled it early on. For that reason, I will _not_ write another vampire story once I finish the last chapter after this. I am going to stick to zombies and nothing will change that so don't request a vampire story from me. I did it once and that's enough.


	23. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

"Oh, Claws is dead!" Princess wailed. "I just know it!"

"Don't say that, dear," Runt said then ran his wet nose through Princess's hackles. "It's Claws we're talking about…she'll be okay."

"How do you know?!" she barked at her mate in a snappy tone. She normally never talked to run like this and it provoked him to back off. "She should've been back by now if she was successful in killing these vampires!"

"Give her time, Princess," Melissa, her oldest friend, said. "I can't imagine it being easy for anyone to kill these vampires…"

"You're right." Princess sighed. She sat down at Runt's side and all the gathered wolves looked out to the horizon, hoping they would see Claws soon. It was just the entire family of Princess and Runt, of those who hadn't been killed, and Melissa. All of Mica's siblings and their mates were here, too. But they weren't the only wolves waiting for Claws to return. Many others who weren't part of the Alpha female were anxiously pacing around the canyon and dens below waiting for word of her return. They could see Claws's six children, who were afraid they were now orphans, playing with their own puppies as their mates kept watch for their mother-in-law. The twelve adults down there—Claws's six children and their six mates—knew what was going on, but their puppies hadn't been told that their grandmother had gone to do something extremely dangerous. And something that could prevent anyone from every seeing Claws alive again. They feared that the next time they saw her Claws would've become one of the vampires due to failing her mission to destroy their Alpha female.

When she didn't return within the next hour, the massive family began to worry.

"She's not coming back," Humphrey said darkly.

But before anyone he'd expected to reply could, he heard a scratchy female voice say something. "You're wrong. I'm right here."

Everyone turned around and was shocked to see Claws alive. She'd known it would've been foolish to show up covered in blood, so she'd bathed in one of the rivers that weren't contaminated with Kate's infected blood before returning. The good news about that contaminated river was that the park rangers had learned there was something in the water after one of their dogs had died from drinking from it. The river was being purified thoroughly by experts called in by the park rangers, according to a few wolves who'd been scouting and witnessed all this.

"The vampire queen and all the others are dead," their mother said. "I took Queen's head off and destroyed her heart, and I saw all the others die in the sun light. I made sure they were all dead and I decapitated any stragglers in their lair. There was only one."

"Mother! You're alive!" Dahlia, the oldest, cried with joy when she saw her mother for the first time in over an hour. "I-I thought we'd lost you like we lost our father before we were born…and like you lost Nytmen…"

"Nytmen isn't entirely lost," Claws said to everyone. "A small part of him is still with me, growing inside my womb."

"What?!" The entire gasped in unison.

"What do you mean?" Mica asked Claws, with shock in her voice, as the orange-colored wolf laid down on her side, showing her belly to the ground.

"In here," Claws said, as she pointed at her exposed underbelly. "He's in here."

"Wait…you're saying that…?" Fleet stammered. "…that you're _pregnant_ with Nytmen's puppies?!"

"Yes," Claws said. "Nytmen and I mated. I am pregnant with his puppies." Then she changed the subject. "And they'll grow up a world safe from vampire wolves, I am sure. We'll all live out the rest of our lives without seeing anymore of them. And it is best that we don't mention this again so we can all slowly forget this even happened…to the best of our ability, anyway. I know we'll never fully forget what happened to our friends and family, but the future looks brighter now that the vampires are all dead."


End file.
